Cheltenham Borough Council is inviting registered architects, or architect-led multidisciplinary design teams, to prepare proposals for the design of an extension to the existing Art Gallery and Museum.

As one of Cheltenham’s key cultural facilities and public buildings, the current Art Gallery & Museum is compromised by difficult access to its main collections and by limited exhibition, storage and other spaces essential to the provision of a quality public art gallery and museum service.

The aim is to address these issues through the development of the semi-derelict site to the east of the Art Gallery & Museum. This will require the removal of some of the existing buildings, to provide adequate space for the new extension, and to establish an appropriate presence on the street - both in terms of scale and proportion.

The new facilities will enable the collections to be more accessible to the widest possible audiences, building on the Art Gallery & Museum’s local, regional and national strengths, through providing larger, flexible temporary exhibition spaces, better public circulation and access within the galleries, improved storage conditions, greater public access to the study collections and more space for the many support services necessary for a modern museum.

www.ribacompetitions.com