Formerly the City Museum and Mappin Art Gallery, the Museum has been at the cultural heart of Sheffield for over 130 years. It opened in 1875 to house the city’s archaeological, natural history, decorative art and social history collections.

In 1998 the City established a new Trust to manage its museums and galleries and under this new partnership began a process of new investment and modernisation for all the City’s museums. The task of refurbishing Weston Park Museum began in March 2003.

A funding package of over £19 million was secured from public and private partners including the Heritage Lottery Fund, Sheffield City Council, European Reader Development Fund Objective 1, Department for Culture Media and Sport/Wolfson Museums and Galleries

Improvement Grant, H&L Cantor Trust, Garfield Weston Foundation, Millennium Commission, Sheffield Town Turst, Freshgate Foundation, Basil Samuel Foundation, Church Burgesses Trust, Holbeche Corfield Settlement and others.

The Trust committed from the outset to work with existing and potential museum users and partnership organisations, resulting in a substantial programme of consultation on content, the appointment of dedicated community staff, an outreach programme - ‘Museum in the Sun’ - which operated during closure and the involvement of Sheffield communities in display development.

Following three years of redevelopment and a multi-million pound transformation, Weston Park Museum opened on 14 October 2006. 55,000 people, including school and community groups, visited in the first 15 days of opening. Admission is free and the doors are open seven days a week.

The Museum is an accessible, welcoming and vibrant place of culture and learning where visitors can explore many beautiful, varied and unusual treasures from Sheffield’s archaeology, natural and social history, and fine an decorative art collections.

Some of your comments:

The new Weston Park Museum is a real joy - hugely family-friendly for all ages - a lovely and slightly idiosyncratic blend of the local and the global which really manages to celebrate Sheffield's identity with a wonderfully light touch.  We especially love the tactile aspect - things to touch and feel and try out as well as to look at and listen to.  It's a museum that really works as a different way of connecting people's lives and experiences with a museum collection.  It shows that you don't need an absolutely world-class collection to provide so many opportunities for engagement and enjoyment at so many different levels.
Philippa Levy, Sheffield – 20 April

We have visited the Weston Park Museum several weeks ago with our local Wildlife Watch Group.  In its nature section, the museum provides an excellent environment for the children to learn about the natural history of the region, about places, people and ecosystems around the world, in a friendly and interactive way.  But it has also sections devoted to the local community, the history of the region and the possible future developments.  I think, this is a place challenging everyone’s knowledge and creativity and I am convinced it deserves this year’s Gulbenkian Prize for Museums and Galleries.
Svetomir Tzokov, Sheffield – 29 April

I am now 72 years old and have visited this museum since childhood.  It has gone from a dull dreary place to a place of light and space, a place for children to explore and learn.  Instead of the silence and being told shush, now there’s the chatter, laughter and questions of children learning by touching and hearing; it is a lovely sound in a museum.  I really enjoy my visits there now I am part of the history in there.
Glenda Heane, Sheffield – 8 May

Another visit to the museum for the whole family this weekend.  I was not even going to go in to the new ‘weather exhibition’ as I did not think they would be able to engage my 3½ and 1 year old – but there we all were – my husband and children running around the vortex putting their hands in the twister and the desert and ice temperatures.  Another example of how learning has been made exciting by this vibrant place.
Barbara Simmons, Sheffield – 8 May

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