Secchi Smith
The museum closed its previous London Wall site in December 2022
As well as its displays, the museum will become a social space featuring day and night time activities like dinner clubs, storytelling events and club nights, while Thameslink trains will even travel through its basement galleries.
The museum’s director Sharon Ament said she hoped to “make Londoners proud”.
Secchi Smith
The market’s basement will have permanent displays of many of the museum’s collection of seven million objects
The venue, which claims to be the world’s largest city museum, said it wanted “to honour the past and present of this major global capital”.
Smithfield’s General Market building will be split into three different sections.
First there will be a covered street which will act as the museum’s entrance called Real Time, where data will be displayed capturing London in the moment.
Visitors will then head beneath the domed market roof to Our Time where events and activities run with organisations like nightclub fabric and immersive theatre group Punchdrunk Enrichment will take place around 13 large installations from London’s living memory.
Smithfield’s General Market was closed and left abandoned in the 1990s
Secchi Smith Asif Khan
Club nights will now be held among the installations beneath the market’s giant dome
“Guest editors” will also be invited to shape the various experiences and events based around different themes like “tastes, sounds and wears [clothes]” so that people can “experience a slice of their city”, according to the museum.
And in the huge market basement below will be galleries featuring permanent displays called Past Time, which will provide an overview of London’s history through chronological and thematic displays.
The silk vest worn by King Charles I when he was beheaded in 1649 will go on display
The bass guitar seen being smashed by The Clash’s Paul Simonon on the cover of album London Calling will be among the artefacts on show
Among the historic items that will be on display are:
Smithfield’s vast Poultry Market building will also form part of the museum but will not open until 2028, with its market workers only shutting shop in August 2023.
The museum said the project had been funded “through a unique partnership between the City of London Corporation and Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, alongside support from a range of philanthropic supporters including Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Goldsmiths’ Foundation, The Linbury Trust and The National Lottery Heritage Fund”.
Ament said the work had been “a long undertaking – not without its challenges but mostly filled with immense joy and hyper-creativity”.
“I hope our museum is a place where people can come together, feel at home, and find themselves grounded in the lives, treasures, challenges and innovations of this city’s vast history.”
Secchi Smith
The Thameslink train line travels through the market’s basement and has been incorporated in the new museum
