The Hold, Ipswich: New £20m archive building officially opens

The Hold houses the majority of the Suffolk Record Office's collection

A new £20m county archives and heritage centre building has formally opened after a delay caused by the pandemic.

The Hold, in Ipswich, was funded mainly by a £10.3m Heritage Lottery grant.

It houses most of Suffolk Record Office's collection and provides facilities for the University of Suffolk.

The county council said the project, which took more than 10 years to complete, had delivered "a Suffolk Archives service for the 21st Century".

The building in Fore Street, a partnership between Suffolk County Council, which pledged £5m toward the project and the university which contributed £2m, is home to more than 900 years of the county's records, preserved by Suffolk Archives.

It includes a Charter of King Henry I granting churches and property to the monks of Eye Priory from about 1119, and contemporary collections of Black Lives Matter protest placards.

The Suffolk Record Office's Emily Tillet and Sarah Steggles with Saxton's 1575 Map of Suffolk, one of the items in the archive

Council chairman Graham Newman said its official opening by the Duke of Gloucester was "an opportunity to recognise the staff and volunteers who have worked so hard to make this possible, through many challenges including a global pandemic".

The project originally attracted criticism from Lowestoft and Bury St Edmunds which held their own archives.

An agreement was reached that local studies units would still be kept at Lowestoft and Bury, with an archive service still being offered at Bury.