The Times has a great article on the The 10 best museum websites.  The top 10 websites are:

Louvre

The State Hermitage Museum

Victoria and Albert Museum

Rijks Museum

Museum of the History of Science

Culture 24

The Smithsonian

The National Archives

museumstuff.com

The Science Museum

The new Museum of WiganLife is set to open this spring, transforming the former History Shop into a ‘heritage hub’ for the Lancashire town.  The museum has received £500,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund and match funding from Wigan Council and Wigan Leisure and Culture Trust.  Displays tell the story of Wigan from the Roman period to today, including displays of Wigan at War and Wigan Sport. There will also be a genealogical area where people can be helped to research their ancestry.

Talks are in place over the possibility of developing a permanent home for the proposed Museum of British Surfing at a site close to Saunton Sands, North Devon. The museum has received approval for 2 development grants, Leader 4 initiative and the North Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty’s sustainable development fund.

National Museums Liverpool (NML), which operates eight museums and galleries in Liverpool, is worth more than £115m to the local economy and supports 2,274 full time jobs in the city.  A study conducted by the North West Research Service (NWRS) revealed that a total of 2.74 million people visited NML museums and galleries during 2008, a 36% increase on 2007. The report also revealed that NML generated £79.3m worth of direct and indirect visitor spend in the local economy. NML directly employs 624 full time jobs while supporting 174 jobs in the area by using regional suppliers.  NML is the only English national museum group based entirely outside of London. The new Museum of Liverpool is under construction and is due to open in 2010-2011. It is expected that over 750,000 will visit the museum annually.

The Great North Museum: Hancock in Newcastle upon Tyne has opened to the public following a £26m restoration.
The museum is located in the former Hancock Museum, which was closed 3 years ago to undergo the redevelopment.
The natural history museum houses 3,500 items from collections from the original Hancock Museum, Newcastle University’s Museum of Antiquities and the Shefton Museum.   The museum includes a planetarium, a bio-wall displaying the diversity of life on Earth, a life-size replica T-Rex skeleton, Ancient Egyptian mummies and a large scale model of Hadrians wall.

Southampton’s oldest museum has been awarded a £3.5m grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, to carry out restoration work that will safeguard its future.

Tudor House dates back to the 15th century and will undergoa refurbishment programme that will enable the Grade 1 listed building and scheduled Ancient Monument to be removed from the ‘Heritage at Risk Register’.

It has been closed since 2002 to allow the first stage of a restoration scheme to take place, including structural stabilisation.

The second phase of work is led by Southampton City Council and includes repair and restoration of the Tudor House Museum and Tudor Merchants Hall, as well as the creation of new visitor facilities, such as toilets, café and a shop. The Tudor Merchants Hall is to become an education base.

Ripon Museum trust has been awarded £823,500 by HLF for the refurbishment of a museum at the city’s former workhouse. The Ripon Workhouse Museum will be enlarged and upgraded. Empty parts of the gatehouse will be brought back into use and a new entrance to the museum will be created. Items currently in storage will be put back on display and a series of temporary exhibitions will be created from a collection of photographs. There will also be a new local studies research centre, toilets and room for research. Work is to begin in the next few months and the museum is to reopen in August.

A record number of people visited the British Museum in London last year to see China’s Terracotta Army exhibition. More than 850,000 people viewed the attraction, the highest attendance figures since the Tutankhamun display in 1972. The overall visitor figures from 2007-8 was 6 million. It was so popular that the museum had to extend its opening hours.

The new wing of London’s Natural History Museum has been unveiled. The Darwin Centre Phase Two is designed around an 8-storey “Cocoon”, encased within a glass atrium.

The temperature controlled Cocoon with house 20 million of the museum’s 34 million plant and insect specimens and laboratories for up to 200 researchers. Visitors can watch the researchers in action, when the centre opens in September 2009. It will be the only place in the UK where visitors can interact daily with natural science experts.

The building, costing £78 million, is designed by C F Moller and by HBG Construction. The building will link the Waterhouse building with the existing Darwin Centre Phase One and the museum’s gardens.

The Tehran Times reported that during the Noruz Holiday period over 6 million tickets to museums were sold over the 13 day break.  This represents a significant increase over previous sales.

Culture Minister Margaret Hodge has recently announced that 43 museums and galleries will benefit from £4 million worth of grants.  The grants from the Department for Culture Media and Sport and the Wolfson Foundation will be used to help improve the quality of displays and the visitor experience.  Read more here.

• The Chamber Pot Museum
• The Potato Museum
• The Kansas Barbed Wire Museum

Read more in The Times.

The Shetland Boat Museum opened in June.  Covering some 3,500sq m the £11.6 million museum traces the history of the ‘Shetland boat’ and is home to over 3,000 artefacts including five boats which are suspended from the ceiling.

The British Museum is planning a £100 million extension to show larger collections.  Planning Permission is being sought and if successful the new extension could open in 2011.

News Wales reports that some attractions in Wales have seen an increase in visitor numbers because of the rain. Several indoor based visitor experiences including Plantasia and Swansea Museum have experienced an increase in visitor numbers.

9th – 10th May
The show brings together suppliers and operators in the museum and heritage sectors.  The show also runs a number of seminars which cover subject areas such as marketing & audience development; design & interpretation and funding & income generation.

To find out more visit the Museums and Heritage show’s website.

The Museums, Libraries and Archives Council provides a wealth of resources. “The Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) is the lead strategic agency for museums, libraries and archives. We are part of the wider MLA Partnership, working with the nine regional agencies to improve people’s lives by building knowledge, supporting learning, inspiring creativity and celebrating identity.” Visit their website to find out more.

An interesting report on the impact (economic, educational and cultural) of national museums and galleries. Valuing Museums: Impact and Innovation among National Museums. (The document is a 2.9mb pdf file).

The Culture Secretary, Tessa Jowell, commented that an extra 30 million people have visited national museums since admission fees were no longer levied.

The Imperial War Museum has reported a 12% increase in admission numbers, whereas the Museum of London has recorded a 30% increase and the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich a 72% increase.