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Ten treasures

A Ford Anglia Saloon. Just one of ten treasures we've picked from our collections to highlight our diverse collections of objects.

Read about our ten treasures

About National Museums Liverpool

National Museums Liverpool is a museums and galleries group comprising a range of venues. We attracted over 2.5 million visitors in 2010.

Using all our assets - staff, collections and buildings - we enable millions of people, from all backgrounds, from all over the world to enjoy the benefits of engagement with a world-class museum service.

Find out our highlights of 2010 in our Annual Review (pdf).

Our museums and galleries

• Museum of Liverpool, (opened 2011)
• World Museum (founded 1851, opened 1860/1, known as Liverpool Museum until 2005)
• Walker Art Gallery (opened 1877)
• Lady Lever Art Gallery (opened 1922)
• Sudley House (built early 19th century)
• Merseyside Maritime Museum (opened 1980. Also home to Seized!, the national museum of HM Revenue and Customs)
• International Slavery Museum (opened 2007)

View a map of where our museums and galleries are.

Our beliefs

• We believe that museums are fundamentally educational in purpose.
• We believe that museums are places for ideas and dialogue that use collections to inspire people.
• We are a democratic museum service and we believe in the concept of social justice: we are funded by the whole of the public and in return we strive to provide an excellent service to the whole of the public.
• We believe in the power of museums to help promote good and active citizenship, and to act as agents of social change.
• We believe in seeking out new opportunities and innovative ways of working, so as to keep our public offer fresh, relevant, challenging and competitive.

Essential facts

National Museums Liverpool...

• holds in trust multi-disciplinary collections of world wide origin made up of more than one million objects and works of art. Get a taste of our collections in our ten treasures
• is an exempt charity by virtue of Schedule 2 to the Charities Act 1993.
• provides educational programmes and activities for school children, young people and adults, serving almost 480,000 students a year through formal learning initiatives alone
• opens to the public seven days a week 361 days a year
• is governed by a board of trustees. Learn more about our trustees
• receives an annual grant, currently £18.4m, from UK central government (through the Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
• generates income from a number of sources, employs 531 people and operates shops, cafés and conference services through NML Trading Ltd.

A year in the life

Each year, National Museums Liverpool...

• welcomes more than 2.2 million visitors
• handles more than 20,000 collection enquiries
• restores and conserves 3,000 objects and works of art
• provides more than 100 loans, involving up to 1,500 objects and works of art
• runs hundreds of courses, lectures, activities and events
• produces scholarly and popular publications
• organises major exhibitions

There's more on our aims, beliefs and achievements in our strategic plan.

Brief history

National Museums and Galleries on Merseyside was established as a national museum group in 1986 because of the outstanding quality of its collections. In 2003 we changed our name to National Museums Liverpool. Our origins go back to 1851 and the founding of Liverpool Museum.