Weston Park Museum

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Grade II* listed Mappin Art Gallery

The war memorial in Weston Park (museum, background, during renovations 2005).

The Weston Park Museum, one mile west of the centre of Sheffield, England, lies beside Weston Park and surrounded by the University of Sheffield. It is managed by the Sheffield Galleries and Museums Trust.

The building, neo-Classical and in the Ionic order, was completed in 1868, and extended twice since. Some of the extension works were funded by donations from local businessman J. G. Graves. The front part of the building was the city museum, while the rear was the art gallery. The art gallery is a Grade II* listed building.

The Weston Park Museum was named the Sheffield City Museum and Mappin Art Gallery until 2006. It opened in 1875, and housed Sheffield's archaeology, natural history, decorative art and social history collections.

The Mappin Art Gallery had a small section given over to a rotating exhibition of the city's collection, but the majority of its galleries contained a contemporary mixture of commissions and touring exhibitions.

The building closed in March 2003 for complete renovation. The £17.3 million re-development was partly funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, Sheffield City Council and Objective 1 for South Yorkshire, and the building reopened on October 2006 as Weston Park Museum, with the City Museum collection re-displayed, while Harold Cantor Gallery will stage changing exhibitions up to four times per year.

Weston Park (2005).

The museum has been updated to appeal to families and non-traditional museum visitors as well as the seasoned museum visitor, and won The Guardian's Family Friendly Museums award in 2008.^[1]

There are five galleries: Sheffield Life and Times, What on Earth!, Treasures, About Art and the Harold Cantor Gallery. In the What on Earth! gallery there are live bees and ants and there is also a weather station monitoring area in the foyer.

Entrance is free and the museum is open every day.

The museum's archaeology exhibits include a replica of the Bronze Age rock art from Gardom's Edge and many items collected by Thomas Bateman, notably the Benty Grange helmet which closely matches the descriptions of warriors' helmets in Beowulf.