What
The Brunel Museum is in an old engine house above the Thames Tunnel in Rotherhithe, south-east London. The 1843 tunnel, which was one of Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s first engineering projects, is thought to be the first constructed under a navigable river. The site is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and an International Landmark Site.
Opened
2000.
Collection
The museum celebrates Brunel’s work with an exhibition that looks at the tunnel as the birthplace of the tube system. There are paintings, engravings and models explaining how the engineering feat was achieved.
Help at hand
About 20 volunteers and three part-time paid staff.
Highlights
“As the birthplace of mass urban transport and the modern city, the site itself is one of the most important in engineering history,” says Robert Hulse, the museum’s director.
Visitors can descend into the chamber created by Brunel as part of the tunnel. There is a pop-up cocktail bar on the roof gardens above the tunnel, which began as part of Culture24’s Museums At Night festival and has become a weekly event.
Budget
Income comes from admission fees (£3 adults) and special events including concerts, lectures and guided walks around Embankment and Bermondsey. Small grants are awarded for projects like the summer play scheme. In 2004 the museum received a grant of £50,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to devise education and outreach programmes.
Visitors
25,000 a year.
Sticky moment
“In 2008 they closed the East London Line, which made it very difficult for people to get to the museum so visitor numbers went down,” Hulse says. “To make sure people still came to the museum, we started collecting them from the second nearest station, Bermondsey. People really enjoyed the walks and we still do them now. The challenge became an opportunity.”
Survival tip
“Try to find ways to appeal to a wider audience,” Hulse says. “Some of our extensions, like the pop-up cocktail bar, have meant that as well as engineering enthusiasts we also have more visitors.”
Future plans
The museum has been awarded a grant of around £25,000 to restore a full entrance and permanent stairway into the tunnel shaft for the first time in 145 years. Work will begin in the summer. “This is hugely exciting as we have been wanting to do this for a long time,” Hulse says.
The Brunel Museum is in an old engine house above the Thames Tunnel in Rotherhithe, south-east London. The 1843 tunnel, which was one of Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s first engineering projects, is thought to be the first constructed under a navigable river. The site is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and an International Landmark Site.
Opened
2000.
Collection
The museum celebrates Brunel’s work with an exhibition that looks at the tunnel as the birthplace of the tube system. There are paintings, engravings and models explaining how the engineering feat was achieved.
Help at hand
About 20 volunteers and three part-time paid staff.
Highlights
“As the birthplace of mass urban transport and the modern city, the site itself is one of the most important in engineering history,” says Robert Hulse, the museum’s director.
Visitors can descend into the chamber created by Brunel as part of the tunnel. There is a pop-up cocktail bar on the roof gardens above the tunnel, which began as part of Culture24’s Museums At Night festival and has become a weekly event.
Budget
Income comes from admission fees (£3 adults) and special events including concerts, lectures and guided walks around Embankment and Bermondsey. Small grants are awarded for projects like the summer play scheme. In 2004 the museum received a grant of £50,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to devise education and outreach programmes.
Visitors
25,000 a year.
Sticky moment
“In 2008 they closed the East London Line, which made it very difficult for people to get to the museum so visitor numbers went down,” Hulse says. “To make sure people still came to the museum, we started collecting them from the second nearest station, Bermondsey. People really enjoyed the walks and we still do them now. The challenge became an opportunity.”
Survival tip
“Try to find ways to appeal to a wider audience,” Hulse says. “Some of our extensions, like the pop-up cocktail bar, have meant that as well as engineering enthusiasts we also have more visitors.”
Future plans
The museum has been awarded a grant of around £25,000 to restore a full entrance and permanent stairway into the tunnel shaft for the first time in 145 years. Work will begin in the summer. “This is hugely exciting as we have been wanting to do this for a long time,” Hulse says.
