Peace Museum reopens inside Victorian mill

Curator Charlotte Houlahan said the third floor of Salts Mill has much more space than their previous location

The Peace Museum in Bradford has reopened at a new site four years after it closed its doors to the public.

An empty room inside Salts Mill in Saltaire has been transformed to house some of the museum's 16,000 artefacts over four months.

The museum opened in 1998 in Piece Hall Yard in Bradford city centre, although objects for its collection were being gathered from 1994 onwards.

A National Lottery heritage grant of just over £245,000 and an additional £150,000 from Bradford 2025 City of Culture helped fund the move to the Grade II listed mill.

An empty room in Salt Mills has been transformed into the museum in just four months

Curator Charlotte Houlahan said all the museum's objects had to moved by hand in cardboard boxes from the old site.

"It's very exciting after four years of closure to have people coming back to see all these amazing objects finally on display.

"Although it (the old site) was a central location it was behind a door, you had to buzz to get in, go up 60 steps, no lifts, so it was inaccessible."

She said the new location was triple the size of the old.

The new location offers educational spaces and a gift shop

The museum in Piece Hall Yard closed at the start of the pandemic as the original site was no longer viable and had issues with access.

The museum's 16,000 artefacts were moved into a specialist basement storage space in Salts Mill with the collection now being rotated in the new exhibition space.

This third-floor area was once a working part of the woollen mill and also has a reception area and toilets.

The museum will be used to give seminars and lectures on peace as well as to display some of its collection of 16,000 artefacts

The museum works closely with the University of Bradford and its Peace Studies Department, which was set up in 1973.

Ms Houlahan said: "We've actually got an object on loan from the university's Commonweal Collection.

"That's the original sketch/artwork of the CND peace symbol drawing from 1958.

"They're a great partner of ours and we're happy to borrow things from their collection."

The peace museum is the only one of its kind in the UK and is part of a network of peace museums world-wide.

Ms Houlahan said: "One of our key messages is hope. And what with everything that has been happening recently it's pertinent that we are reopening today."

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