Archive - Thursday, 4 April 2002


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Ryedale Folk Museum seeks green light for £500,000 revamp

ONE of Ryedale's most popular tourist attractions is seeking approval for a £500,000 revamp.

Bosses at Ryedale Folk Museum, at Hutton-le-Hole, want to increase space at the museum for volunteers and exhibits.

Several 17th century buildings at the museum, set up to illustrate the history of rural life in Ryedale, will get attention and storage buildings will be built to maintain old artefacts.

Museum curator Martin Watts said: "We want to build a workshop and a storage building and provide an extension to the existing visitors' centre. The workshop will provide much-needed space for our volunteers. We have around 120 people on our books at the moment, but we can only have a few in at a time."

Generous donations of old objects means the number of exhibits has outgrown storage space available, explained Mr Watts.

"We are looking after the objects we are given, but we have very little space," he added. "The storage building needs to be a constant temperature and humidity to enable us to look after the items properly.

"The main building, the Manor House in the centre of the museum, will be restored to the way it looked when it was built between 1630 and 1690."

Finally, part of the main entrance building will be converted into exhibition space to enable more artefacts to be put on display. "We haven't started raising any money for the project yet because we first need to find out if we are allowed to do it," said Mr Watts. "We have submitted a planning application to the North York Moors National Park Authority."

Updated: 12:32 Thursday, April 04, 2002