Ensure A Future for Torquay Museum

Torquay Museum profile

Project by Torquay Museum

Total raised £11,785

raised so far

+ est. £1883.25 Gift Aid

398

supporters

Torquay Museum, home to internationally important ice age collections, is closed due to COVID-19. Without income, our future is at risk.

We're still collecting donations

On the 20th July 2020 we'd raised £10,793 with 386 supporters in 42 days. But as every pound matters, we're continuing to collect donations from supporters.

Help Support the Museum in these Challenging Times

As a charity, we are always fundraising to support our work of looking after the Museum and all its collections - for us it is always a year round activity but all our planed events this year are canceled. Even though we have raised just over £11,000 (with Gift Aid) thanks to your fantastic generosity, we will be keeping the Crowdfunding page open. Any additional donations received will be put towards the continued care and conservation of our collections and building including maintaining and improving the permanent displays and the temporary exhibitions we put on each year.

Thanks to the public support through this Crowdfunding campaign and the Torbay Council business support grant we are now out of immediate danger and we can confirm we will be re-opening around the 22nd July. All donations received to date will be used to help with our re-opening and make the visitor experience as safe and enjoyable as possible including the setting up of a brand new temporary exhibition.

Thank you for supporting us!

1590942008_torquay_museum_reduced.jpg

An Exceptional Museum in the English Riviera.   

Torquay Museum holds an exceptional collection for a regional Museum of over 330,000 items. Its Designated Quaternary Collection and Archive is the finest of its type in a regional museum in the UK. This comprises over 30,000 specimens of national or international importance and the most important associated archive related to this subject in Britain. The Museum’s general archive and image collection can also boast an exceptional letter collection amassed by Museum founder, William Pengelly’s daughter, Hester Pengelly, which includes probably the finest Jane Austen letter, a correspondence collection with Charles Lyle, letters from Darwin, Shackleton, Napoleon and many other globally important figures. It also has a large archive from the South American explorer Col. Percy Harrison Fawcett.   

1590665446_p1080739_reduced.jpg

The Museum also holds a highly important social history collection which can be considered the County Collection for this subject. It contains over 7,000 specimens covering many different themes from local costume to World War II. However, it is the Devon Rural life collection of around 1,800 items that stands out as one of the finest regional social history collections in the UK. It contains a large number of unique pre-industrial revolution items many of provenanced regional type. This collection was published by Peter Breares, as’ The Old Devon Farmhouse’ (1998). 

The Museum holds many other regionally and locally important collections. Our world cultures collections of around 3,000 items contain exceptional Fijian items some published recently by the Fijian Art Research Project and an as yet un-researched collection from Opium War China of similar quality. Our local geology collections contain thousands of Devonian fossils and rock specimens relating to Torbay’s exceptional Geological heritage recognised in the English Riviera Global Geopark, the only urban Geopark in the world. We also hold the only collection of items relating to the Torquay marble industry, closely associated with the Geopark. We are expanding, researching and publishing this collection, and a more permanent gallery in the Museum is also planned.  

1590404014_p1130888_reduced.jpg

The Museum needs more than £170,000 a year from visitor income to remain sustainable and to keep its doors open to visitors and these collections accessible.  

1592913732_ach.jpg

One of the rewards is a choice of 1 of 5 of A4 Agatha Christie Prints

At the time we closed due to the COVID19 pandemic we were working on a major project.

Torquay Museum 175 is a dynamic, community focused project, supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, celebrating the Museum’s past and looking to its future. Our collections will form the basis of two exhibitions created as part of this project. One curated by local people celebrating 175 years of Torquay Museum, the other taking the Museum outside its walls to showcase the photographic collection for free on the streets of Torbay. Working with many partners the project was also documenting and developing the Museum’s regionally important lantern slide collection of 7,000 images. This collection is linked to the history of the Museum and the learned society which founded it. Documentation and digitisation will preserve these images and make them accessible to the public for the first time. 

Engaging varied audiences and particularly local people through social media formed a key part to the project. This project provided opportunities for people to become involved with the project through community curation, the production of a film by local young people, a programme of contemporary collecting through a photographic engagement project and a diverse programme of special events, lectures and a celebratory conference.

1590834626_collage_reduced_reduced.jpg

Your donations will help us restart this programme of work which was seeing so much involvement from the local community. 

Become a fundraiser

Want to raise funds for this cause? It's simple to get started.

Start fundraising

Rewards

This project offered rewards

£5 or more

Donation

Can you spare five pounds to help us keep sharing Torbay's history?

£6 or more

Concessions Ticket (60+, students, disabled...)

We'll send you a concessions annual ticket which can be used when we are able to reopen. Concessions are available for senior citizens (60+), students in full time education, those in receipt of state benefit assistance, and disability allowance.

£7 or more

Guidebook

We'll send you a Museum Guidebook.

£10 or more

Adult Ticket

We'll send you an adult annual ticket which can be used when we are able to reopen.

£14 or more

Small Family Ticket (1 adult + 2 children)

We'll send you a small family annual ticket which can be used when we are able to reopen.

£20 or more

Family Ticket (2 adults + 2 children)

We'll send you a family annual ticket which can be used when we are able to reopen.

£25 or more

Local Print

We'll send you an A4 print of your choice from our collection, subject to availability.

£30 or more

Insure a Day!

It costs £30 a day to insure the Museum's Internationally important Collections. Please sponsor a day and we will put your name on a special donors' page on our website and send you a Guidebook.

£35 or more

Agatha Christie Print

We'll send you an A4 B&W print of Agatha Christie, a choice of 1 of 5. See the options on the page - we'll be in touch after the campaign to find out which you'd like

£60 or more

Agatha Christie Print and a Second Hand Book

We will send you an A4 B&W print (choice of 1 of 5) and an Agatha Christie second hand book of your choice, subject to availability.

£100 or more

Adopt a Handaxe

Adopt one of the oldest handaxes in Britain (over 525,000 years old) from Kent's Cavern for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the handaxe and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Fawcett's Amazon Expedition Diary 1920-1921

Adopt Fawcett's diary for a year! This expedition diary includes detailed maps and a secret location of The Lost City of 'Z' as well as comparative texts that Fawcett thought might have been Atlantean in origin. We will put your name in the case next to the diary and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£150 or more

Private Tour of the Agatha Christie Gallery

A unique opportunity for you and up to five people to get a private tour of the Agatha Christie Gallery and having your photo taken at Poirot's desk.

£250 or more

Private Tour Behind the Scenes and Afternoon Tea

A unique opportunity for you and up to five people to get a private tour of the Museum and its stores (dependent on social distancing restrictions) followed by an afternoon tea in Pengelly's cafe.

£100 or more

Adopt a Torquay Terracotta Figure

Adopt a Torquay Terracotta figure of your choice for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the figure and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Torquay Marble Plaque of Babbacombe Beach

Adopt a Torquay Marble Plaque of Babbacombe Beach for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the plaque and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Hercule Poirot's Cane

Adopt Hercule Poirot's Cane for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the cane and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt a Torquay Regatta Cup

Adopt the 1825 silver guilt Torquay Regatta Cup presented to BELLE SAVAGE for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the cup and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Torquay Mayor's Regalia

Adopt Torquay Mayor's robe and hat from the 1940s for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the cane and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Hercule Poirot's Suit

Adopt Hercule Poirot's suit worn by David Suchet in early episodes of Poirot for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the suit and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Miss Marple's Costume

Adopt Miss Marple's Costume worn by Joan Hickson who played Miss Marple in all 12 adaptation for the BBC (1984 - 1992) for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the costume and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Poirot's Desk and Chair

Adopt Hercule Poirot's Desk and Chair from the ITV TV series for a year! We will put your name on the desk and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Woodley's Marble Goldfinch Platter

Adopt a Woodley's Marble Goldfinch Platter that once belonged to Queen Victoria and was in Buckingham Palace before being donated to the Museum for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the platter and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt Poirot's Lounge Furniture

Adopt Hercule Poirot's Lounge Furniture from the ITV TV series for a year! We will put your name on the table in the middle of the lounge and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£100 or more

Adopt a Hyaena Skull

Adopt a hyaena skull excavated from Kent's Cavern by A.H. Ogilvie for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the skull and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£150 or more

Adopt Agatha Christie's Fur Coat

Adopt Agatha Christie's Fur Coat on loan from the National Trust at Greenway for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the coat and we'll also send you an annual ticket to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£250 or more

Adopt Psamtek's Coffin

Adopt Museum's most popular object - a coffin of Egyptian boy Psamtek for a year! We will put your name in the case next to the coffin and we'll also send you 2 annual tickets to the Museum and a Guidebook.

£500 or more

Adopt KC4

Adopt Museum's most iconic object KC4 - the oldest modern human fossil in the UK for a year! We will put your name in the case next to KC4 and we'll also send you 4 annual tickets to the Museum and a Guidebook.

Payment and personal details are protected