Culture of Plymouth - Museums, Art Galleries and Historic Buildings

Museums, Art Galleries and Historic Buildings

The Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery in Drake Circus has collections of fine and decorative arts, natural history and human history. It is closed for renovation until autumn 2008.

The Plymouth Arts Centre, established in 1948, is located near the Barbican, and regularly offers visiting displays of work by a wide range of local, British and international artists such as Beryl Cook, Richard Deacon, Andy Goldsworthy and Sir Terry Frost. As well as promoting visual arts, many independent art house and foreign films are shown.


A converted church on North Hill, now the Sherwell Centre and part of the university, hosts regular exhibitions, concerts, recitals, lectures and other public events. There are smaller and privately owned retail galleries in the Barbican.

Also in Plymouth are the Plymouth and West Devon Record Office, Smeaton's Tower, the Elizabethan House, and Merchants House in The Barbican. Plymouth is home to the National Marine Aquarium. The Plymouth Synagogue, in Catherine Street, was built in 1762.

Plymouth Naval Base Museum is a maritime museum under development at HMNB Devonport.

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