The redevelopment of Tate Liverpool, which has been closed since 2023, has been boosted by a £12m cash injection from the UK government. The sum brings the total contribution to the project by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to £18.6m.
The key regional UK gallery, located on the city’s Royal Albert Dock, received the £12m funding boost from the Public Bodies Infrastructure Fund, which is awarded by the DCMS. It also received further philanthropic donations from the Garfield Weston Foundation (£3m), the Wolfson Foundation (£1.25m) and the Ross Warburton Charitable Trust, alongside other trusts and individuals. The UK Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government also awarded £10m to the gallery, which it secured through a combined £20m bid with National Museums Liverpool.
Tate Liverpool was initially due to reopen this year following an overhaul which was previously forecast to cost £29.7m. However, difficulty in raising the funds led the gallery to postpone its relaunch until 2027.
According to the figures above, supplied by Tate Liverpool, a minimum of £32.85m has now been raised. A spokesperson confirmed that project is now costed at £35m, and is entering its final phase of fundraising ahead of 2027.
Helen Legg, the director of Tate Liverpool, told the BBC earlier this year that work on the project started before the pandemic. “It has become more difficult. Now we are close to achieving our goals. It’s taken us a little bit more time,” she said. Tate Liverpool has meanwhile been temporarily housed at the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) North on nearby Mann Island.
According to a Tate statement, the designs for the new gallery, drawn up by 6a Architects, show “a new public Art Hall and events space on the ground floor, opened up to admit sunlight and views across the historic dock. New gallery spaces over three floors will showcase the incredible diversity of Tate’s collection and are interspersed with public riverside foyers”.
Tate Liverpool, which opened in 1988, was designed by James Stirling who converted the northwest corner of a seven-story warehouse standing on the Royal Albert Dock into the five-storey gallery. Tate Liverpool has been closed since October 2023. It received 405,000 visitors in 2022, its last full year, and 660,000 in 2019, before the Covid-19 pandemic.
Earlier this year, Tate announced plans to cut 7% of its workforce as part of an institution-wide push to reduce costs.
Tate Liverpool has been approached for comment.
