Holburne Plans for New Basement Agreed

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Holburne Museum’s Planning Application Agreed

The Holburne Museum’s application to amend the plans for the basement of the new extension has today been endorsed by B&NES Development Control Committee. Since the Holburne’s closure in July the Development Team have been working with archaeologists, engineers and contractors to prepare the site for building work.

Excavations have shown that a vault (filled in during the C20th) in which it was intended to locate the Collection’s essential air-conditioning plant cannot be used for this purpose without significant modification to what appears to be part of the original 1796 building.

In light of this the Holburne will increase the size of the new basement and reallocate facilities throughout the existing and new basements. This makes the best use of the available space and minimizes the intervention to the fabric of the Grade I listed building.

Alexander Sturgis, Director of the Holburne notes: “We are delighted to be able to move forward with this essential project. We are working constructively and well with planning officers to sort out the few remaining points of detail and are confident that we will be starting the major works early in the New Year.”

For further information please contact: Katie Jenkins
T: E: k.jenkins@bath.ac.uk

NOTES

The Holburne Museum
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, Stubbs and Turner. Housed in the 18th century Sydney Hotel and set within the park of Sydney Gardens, it is Bath’s most beautiful museum (www.bath.ac.uk/holburne).

The Museum has closed to undertake a major redevelopment that will see its existing home restored, refurbished and extended through a striking extension designed by Eric Parry Architects. The development will make the Museum fully accessible to all for the first time, create a purpose designed education space and allow more of the collection to be displayed than ever before. The renewed Holburne is scheduled to reopen in late 2010. The Holburne Museum is a registered charity (no. 310288). The development is supported by a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund (www.hlf.org.uk).

Published on: 17/12/2008