Fleetwood Museum is a local history and maritime museum in the English seaside town of

Fleetwood Fleetwood is a coastal town in the Borough of Wyre in Lancashire, England, at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It had a population of 25,939 at the 2011 census. Fleetwood acquired its modern character in the 1830s, when the principal lando ...

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancas ...

. The museum was originally the town's

Customs House A custom house or customs house was traditionally a building housing the offices for a jurisdictional government whose officials oversaw the functions associated with importing and exporting goods into and out of a country, such as collecting ...

and, completed in 1836, was one of the first buildings constructed in Fleetwood. Like much of the town it was designed by architect

Decimus Burton Decimus Burton (30 September 1800 – 14 December 1881) was one of the foremost English architects and landscapers of the 19th century. He was the foremost Victorian architect in the Roman revival, Greek revival, Georgian neoclassical and R ...

. The building became the local town hall and is now a maritime museum. It has been designated a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern I ...

Historic England Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked w ...

History

Fleetwood was planned by local landowner

Peter Hesketh-Fleetwood Sir Peter Hesketh-Fleetwood, 1st Baronet, (9 May 1801 – 12 April 1866) was an English landowner, developer and Member of Parliament, who founded the town of Fleetwood, in Lancashire, England. Born Peter Hesketh, he changed his name ...

who employed

to lay out the town and design many of the buildings. Hesketh-Fleetwood intended his town to be a major port and Burton designed the Customs House as one of the first buildings, completed in 1836. In 1876 it became the private residence of Alexander Carson, who extended the building to the north, and named it "Wyre Holm"; the customs offices were transferred to another building on the same terrace. The building became Fleetwood's Town Hall in 1889. The building continued to serve as the meeting place of Fleetwood Urban District Council from its formation in 1894, and remained as such after the area was advanced to the status of

municipal borough Municipal boroughs were a type of local government district which existed in England and Wales between 1835 and 1974, in Northern Ireland from 1840 to 1973 and in the Republic of Ireland from 1840 to 2002. Broadly similar structures existed in S ...

in 1933, but ceased to be the local seat of government after the formation of the enlarged

Wyre Borough Council Wyre may refer to: Places * Wyre, Orkney, an island in Scotland * Borough of Wyre, a local government district in Lancashire, England ** Wyre (UK Parliament constituency) * River Wyre, a river in Lancashire, England * Wyre Forest, a woodland in ...

at Poulton-le-Fylde in 1974. It subsequently served as the offices of the Borough Treasurer and the Borough Housing Director of Wyre Borough Council before, for a short time, being occupied by a private school and in 1992, becoming Fleetwood Museum. On 31 March 1978,

designated the building a Grade II

. The Grade II designation—the lowest of the three grades—is for buildings that are "nationally important and of special interest".

Architecture

Fleetwood Museum is on two storeys. It is built of

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicat ...

, rendered with

roughcast Roughcast or pebbledash is a coarse plaster surface used on outside walls that consists of lime and sometimes cement mixed with sand, small gravel and often pebbles or shells. The materials are mixed into a slurry and are then thrown at th ...

lime plaster Lime plaster is a type of plaster composed of sand, water, and lime, usually non-hydraulic hydrated lime (also known as slaked lime, high calcium lime or air lime). Ancient lime plaster often contained horse hair for reinforcement and pozzolan ...

. The front façade has eight ranges of

sash window A sash window or hung sash window is made of one or more movable panels, or "sashes". The individual sashes are traditionally paned windows, but can now contain an individual sheet (or sheets, in the case of double glazing) of glass. History ...

s. The building is accessed from the front through two

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cul ...

s. Both entrances are at the top of stone staircases and flanked by

column A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression (physical), compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column i ...

s—the south entrance by round

Doric Doric may refer to: * Doric, of or relating to the Dorians of ancient Greece ** Doric Greek, the dialects of the Dorians * Doric order, a style of ancient Greek architecture * Doric mode, a synonym of Dorian mode * Doric dialect (Scotland) * Doric ...

columns and the north entrance by square columns. Between the two staircases there are iron railings with spear-shaped

finial A finial (from '' la, finis'', end) or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the apex of a dome, spire, towe ...

s. At the roof line there is a

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). ...

with ornamental iron decoration and corner

s. Below the parapet there is a blocking

course Course may refer to: Directions or navigation * Course (navigation), the path of travel * Course (orienteering), a series of control points visited by orienteers during a competition, marked with red/white flags in the terrain, and corresponding ...

and a moulded

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

''Harriet''

The fishing smack ''Harriet'', built in Fleetwood in 1893, was moved to the museum in 1998. It is housed in a purpose-built building behind the main museum building. It is registered as a member of the

National Historic Fleet The National Historic Fleet is a list of historic ships and vessels located in the United Kingdom, under the National Historic Ships register. National Historic Ships UK is an advisory body which advises the Secretary of State for Culture, Media ...

Threatened and actual closures

The Fleetwood Museum Trust is a charity established in 2006, with the stated aim "to save Fleetwood Museum from closure". In November 2015 it was announced that

Lancashire County Council Lancashire County Council is the upper-tier local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Lancashire, England. It consists of 84 councillors. Since the 2017 election, the council has been under Conservative control. Prior to the 2009 L ...

would withdraw funding from five of its museums: Fleetwood Museum,

Helmshore Mills Textile Museum Helmshore Mills are two mills built on the River Ogden in Helmshore, Lancashire. Higher Mill was built in 1796 for William Turner, and Whitaker's Mill was built in the 1820s by the Turner family. In their early life they alternated between wo ...

, Judges' Lodgings,

Museum of Lancashire The Museum of Lancashire is an historic collection in Preston in Lancashire, England. The museum, which is based in the old Sessions House, is a Grade II listed building. History Construction of the courthouse, which was commissioned to accommo ...

and

Queen Street Mill Queen Street Mill is a former weaving mill in Harle Syke, a suburb to the north-east of Burnley, Lancashire, that is a It was built in 1894 for the Queen Street Manufacturing Company. It closed on 12 March 1982 and was mothballed, but was su ...

, because of what the leader of the council described as "the financial challenges facing the county council as we deal with relentless cuts to central government funding combined with rising demand for our services". They were initially to close at the end of March 2016 but that month were reprieved until September 2016. Local supporters are opposing the closure, and Fleetwood Town Council agreed in January 2016 to "register an expression of interest" in funding the future of the museum. The Museum closed on 30 September 2016, along with the other four Lancashire museums mentioned above, except for pre-booked school groups. the Fleetwood Museum Trust website stated: At the same date Lancashire County Council's website stated that "Negotiations are underway with a potential new operator." The museum reopened on 14 April 2017. Lancashire County Council's website stated that: The museum was open in 2017, 2018 and 2019, but it had not reopened because of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

. It reopened in May 2021.

References

;Footnotes ;Bibliography * * * * *

External links