A  new Museum and Cultural Centre for the islands is coming soon

We plan to bring the Town Hall back to life, creating a space which celebrates the people, stories and culture of the Isles of Scilly.

Discover more about what’s happening and explore our plans for this landmark project for the islands.

Our much-loved Grade II listed Town Hall in Hugh Town, St Mary’s, has always been a place for the community to gather and to welcome visitors.

Now - led by the Council of the Isles of Scilly working in partnership with the Isles of Scilly Museum - there are plans to rejuvenate that legacy by creating an attractive, year-round venue. It will act as a new home to the museum, provide a welcoming indoor performance space for live music and theatre and act as an essential community hall.

About The Project

Fly through the new Museum and Cultural Centre

We’ve created this fly-through the inside of the Town Hall, giving you the chance to imagine what it will be like inside the building once the work is complete. Take a peek inside some of the galleries and imagine the impressive Klondike displayed for all to admire!

  • “I would tell you of the gorgeous, indescribable sunsets, which turn sea and sky into flaming fire, and cast a magic glow over the land… making each little distant island a fairy palace of enchantment.”

    —Jessie Mothersole, The Isles of Scilly

  • “It is a place of great beauty and violence, warmed by the sea but exposed to waves that have come all the way from America.”

    —Sam Llewellyn describes Hell Bay

  • “The Isles of Scilly are the land of the narcissus and the daffodil… Arum lilies, stocks, wallflowers, and crimson anemones are grown abundantly… There had always been, time beyond the memory of man, more or less wild narcissi growing on the isles.”

    —Charles G. Harper, The Cornish Coast (South) and the Isles of Scilly

  • “Beaches of dazzling white; wildly-heaped earns; here a cromlech, a logan stone, a barrow; a new view of sea and sky and white-footed rock… strange places, beautiful places.”

    - S.Baring-Gould, A Book of the West Being an Introduction to Devon and Cornwall, Vol. II.

 

The new Museum and Cultural Centre will include:

  • A first-class museum to showcase permanent collections, library and archives, encapsulating the stories of the archipelago and signposting visitors to the off-islands

  • Year-round entertainment with flexible space (including retractable seating) for performances, talks, music and cinema

  • Showcasing local art, food, products and crafts with space for markets, galleries, seasonal events and festivals

  • Skills and learning providing opportunities for young people and adults to develop informally and improving employability

  • Promoting community wellbeing, sociability and creativity through safe, welcoming and inclusive breakout and communal spaces for groups

  • Venue hire for private functions and community events, with retail and café space

  • Help us put Scilly's place names on the map

    From rocky outcrops and winding tracks to fields, coves and forgotten hamlets, the Isles of Scilly are full of place names that don’t always make it onto modern maps - but live on in memory, family stories and everyday conversation.

    Find out more

  • Join us as our part-time Volunteer Coordinator

    We are looking for our first Volunteer Coordinator, working three days per week. This exciting new role will work across the organisation to help develop systems and support and recruit a new wonderful volunteer team.

    Find out more

  • New art works capture Tresco’s unique hybrids

    On the tiny island of Tresco, 28 miles off the Cornish coast, something extraordinary is happening – creating hybrid plant species that exist nowhere else on Earth.

    Plants from five continents have been growing side by side in the lush, sub-tropical Abbey Gardens on Tresco for 150 years. In that time, they have begun cross-pollinating to create unique hybrids, entirely undocumented until now.

    Find out more

Read our latest blog posts to learn more about our progress and plans

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