Bristol City Museum & Art Gallery

Bristol Museum & Art Gallery stands in Clifton, half a mile north-west of the city centre. The Edwardian Baroque building, designed by Frederick Wills, opened in 1905 on a site donated by tobacco baron Sir William Henry Wills. It replaced an earlier 1872 Venetian Gothic museum that had merged with the Bristol Library Society. The current structure has two large halls with barrel-vaulted glazed roofs, linked by a double staircase. In 1930 a rear extension funded by Sir George Alfred Wills provided more gallery space. During the Second World War the 1872 building was gutted by fire, but the 1930 extension survived with blast damage. The museum holds nationally designated collections in geology, Eastern art and Bristol’s history. Its Egyptology gallery displays mummies and 3,000-year-old Assyrian reliefs transferred from the Royal West of England Academy. The Eastern art section includes the Schiller collection of Chinese ceramics from the Tang and Song dynasties. Natural history and archaeology galleries cover local, national and international finds. The art galleries present works from all periods, including modern Bristol paintings and pieces by internationally famous artists. Visitors enter two spacious halls lit by glazed roofs and climb the central staircase to the upper galleries. The Egyptology gallery shows mummies alongside ancient wall decorations. Eastern art displays fine Chinese porcelain in white, light blue and green glazes. Natural history cases hold geology specimens and stone tools. The art galleries display everything from classical paintings to modern works. Outside, the building’s Edwardian Baroque façade and Portland stone entrance face Park Street.