Ironbridge Gorge Museums

Blists Hill Victorian Town, the flagship visitor attraction within Shropshire’s Ironbridge Gorge World Heritage Site.  It is set to get a major transformation thanks to a £10 million grant package from Advantage West Midlands and the European Regional Development Fund. One of the ten Ironbridge Gorge Museums, it is internationally recognised for its accurate interpretation of the trades of a small manufacturing and mining town at the end of the Victorian era, and for offering a great day out for all.

The first project will be the construction of a new entrance and visitor centre to the museum which will include a café and shop with good disabled access. Plans are also in place for a replica narrow gauge railway, similar to that extensively used in the mineral industries of the gorge a century ago. The track will follow the Blists Hill canal and link up with an incline plane lift to take visitors to and from the Village Green, where they will find a Fun Fair during the summer months. Four or five new shops will be added at the top of the town while a cluster of manufacturing workshops will expand still further the number of trades demonstrated to visitors. Additional space for car-parking and park-and-ride services will also be added.

Visitors to the site, which will remain open throughout, will be able to gain a greater understanding of how a ‘Victorian town is built’ as they watch the work in progress. The hoardings surrounding the areas under construction will become ‘galleries of interpretation’, covered in giant canvases, designed by local community groups and depicting various themes. Also on display will be historic photographs that have provided inspiration for the project along with

contemporary architect’s plans.

On certain days visitors will be treated to guided tours of the site, which explore the various development plans and reveal many insights into the fascinating research that has informed the project. A different tour will allow visitors a glimpse behind the scenes, looking at some of the objects in the Museum’s reserve collections that will be on display once the construction work is complete.

A new Creative Industries Centre will be opening in 2007 alongside the recently restored Jackfield Tile Museum, one of the ten Ironbridge Gorge Museums within the Ironbridge Gorge World Heritage Site, Shropshire.

Open to visitors, on selected days, ‘The New Building’, supported by the Creative Industries Action Plan, will be home to displays and workshops for several top artisans creating high quality artworks from glass and other fine materials.

There will also be a monumental stone mason skilled in the production of memorial and public artwork and a fine art printer specialising in Shropshire scenes, as well as a tandem construction and cycle hire centre.

2007 marks the 250th anniversary of Thomas Telford’s birth, the 18th century engineer responsible for the design of many innovative bridges, roads and canals and after whom Telford town was named.  This will be marked by a variety of celebrations and an exhibition in the Coalbrookdale Gallery, adjacent to the Museum of Iron.

Telephone 01952 884 391