Holburne Museum (Bath)

United Kingdom / England / Bath
An art gallery facing the end of Great Pulteney Street and set in the lovely Sydney Gardens. Modern extension planned that has caused debate among Bath residents.
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The Museum Building was originally designed as the The Sydney Hotel
Since 1916 the Museum has been housed in the former Sydney Hotel at the end of Great Pulteney Street. The original design for the Hotel, prepared by Thomas Baldwin in 1794, was a two-storey building which would serve the pleasure gardens laid out by Baldwin beyond. These gardens still survive and are the only remaining eighteenth-century pleasure gardens in the country. Owing to the failure of the Bath Bank, Baldwin was bankrupted, and his design for the hotel was never implemented. Instead a three-storey building was designed by Charles Harcourt Masters. The foundation stone was laid on 16 November 1796 and the building was ready for use in the summer of 1799.
www.holburne.org/muse/browse/theme1/topics.cfm?chapter=...
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:   51°23'8"N   2°21'4"W

Comments

  • One of the country's great small museums, The Holburne has a wonderfully rich collection of paintings, silver, sculpture, furniture and porcelain, with important works by Gainsborough, Guardi, Stubbs and Turner. The Museum has packed up its collection and is now closed to the public. A development programme of refurbishment and extension is scheduled to be finished by 2010. The scheme designed by Eric Parry Architects is supported by a grant of £4.875 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The exciting proposals address all of the problems facing the Museum today and whilst restoring the existing Grade One listed building, will also create a beautiful new building which together will allow the Holburne to flourish as the active, vibrant and engaging Museum that is needs to be.
This article was last modified 15 years ago