Liverpool museums to close for three years to undergo £58m transformation

The International Slavery Museum and Maritime Museum will shut in early 2025 as work begins on the Grade I-listed venues and a new pavilion-style main entrance is added to the Dr Martin Luther King Jr Building.

A striking iron and glass bridge will connect the re-imagined International Slavery Museum galleries in the Hartley Pavilion to the annexed MLK Jr Building, which was formerly home to Granada Television, and offer spectacular views both into and out of the Royal Albert Dock.

National Museums Liverpool (NML) said the overhaul of the site, which will link up the venues and bring exhibitions on the history of the slave trade together, was needed to become “more sustainable and meet the needs of the museum’s audiences.”

Planning documents submitted by NML said the regeneration of the building is an “important and essential part of National Museums Liverpool’s Waterfront Transformation Project, which sets an ambitious vision for Liverpool Waterfront.”

As part of this, the MLK Jr building will become a dedicated entrance to the wider Maritime Museum for the first time in its history, with multi-functional cultural spaces including the new National Centre for Teaching Black History and continuing the partnership with the Centre for Study of International Slavery.

Michelle Charters OBE, head of the International Slavery Museum, said the application represented an “important decision for our city that will have an everlasting impact on the world.” She added: “The decision today will further strengthen the importance of the only museum of its kind in the world in our beloved city’s future.”

To allow for the work to take place, both venues will close in early 2025 for works to begin, reopening to the public in 2028. Planning documents said the building hasn’t received any significant investment since the museum was created, so “there is a definite need to refresh as well as becoming more sustainable and meeting the needs of the museum’s audiences.”

It was said challenges within the building are “founded in the need for substantial change in bringing the building into a new, prominent and public use.” These include an “imposing, neoclassical entrance that expresses narratives of power and dominion, resonant with the site’s history in mercantile wealth and the transatlantic slave trade during a period of empire and colonialism.

“This must be addressed to reconfigure the building’s relationship with its new international role and the people who will use it as a place of remembrance, renewal and innovation.” NML said it would seek to use the building, formerly home to Granada Television in the 1980s before being bought by the museum group in 2008, as “a public and cultural venue, and as a resource for local people and communities, necessitates transformational change in its relationship with the public realm and with the city of Liverpool.”

It added: “This demands the creation of a bold new entrance, worthy of the global agenda and position to which the museum aspires.” Backing the scheme, Cllr Joe Hanson said the scheme would “keep alive the history of our city.”

Laura Pye, director, National Museums Liverpool, said: “This important milestone represents the hard work and dedication of all those involved in the redevelopment of both the International Slavery Museum and Maritime Museum. Throughout the process we have been guided by our community stakeholders and this bold and exciting approach is a testament to their energy, knowledge and experience, alongside the powerful collections and stories both museums hold.”