National Trust cuts 550 jobs
PLUS: V&A's 'raised eyebrows' at Bayeux Tapestry loan
Friday 11 July 2025 | news from museums, galleries, heritage and art, including:
Truss trashes (not so) secret Parthenon plans 🇬🇷
Bristol museum beaten to Turner’s lost masterpiece ☹️
Vast Gerhard Richter retrospective coming to Paris 🇫🇷
Happy Friday.
This has been the most news-heavy weeks I can remember in the near eight years I’ve been writing this newsletter. Stories — some of them genuinely huge for the museum and art world — have come thick and fast. It’s been hard to keep up!
In news terms though nothing will beat the announcement that the Bayeux Tapestry will coming back to the UK, on loan to the British Museum. An enormous story, that I have no doubt will be the most important and most popular exhibition on these shores in the 21st century, perhaps ever. A hat-tip to Craig Simpson at the Telegraph who first broke the story on Tuesday lunchtime. A full report on all the aspects of this news you need to know is below.
So big was this story though, there were three HUGE 2026 exhibitions announced that you've probably missed because of coverage of the Bayeux deal.
All are coming next year and all could ordinarily claim to be the most-anticipated blockbuster of 2026 — if it wasn't for the Bayeux Tapestry news. And they’d also all ordinarily get their own dedicated slots in this newsletter but, alas, the news volume of the past seven days was so great this is the only place I can fit them in!
So here are the newly-announced shows to add to your 2026 to-visit list in case you missed them ⤵
📣 The National Gallery will host the biggest Renoir exhibition in Britain for 20 years. 'Renoir and Love' will feature over 50 major works, including the iconic Bal au Moulin de la Galette (1876) which will come to the UK for the very first time.
📣 The first-ever exhibition in Britain dedicated to fashion house Schiaparelli is coming to the Victoria and Albert Museum. Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art will have over 200 items and will feature brand new research.
📣 Kew Gardens will stage the world’s largest outdoor exhibition devoted to the great Henry Moore. An enormous THIRTY of Moore’s monumental sculptures will be brought together at the Unesco world heritage site.
Add in the Tracey Emin and Frida Kahlo shows at Tate Modern, the Whistler exhibition at Tate Britain, and the opening of V&A East museum and the new London Museum means that 2026 will be one of the biggest years for museums and galleries in the British capital in memory.
maxwell
ps Thank you to everyone who voted in last week’s poll on how ‘fresh’ the news stories are in this newsletter for you. I’m so pleased with the results. Read to the end to see the full breakdown of how much news you get from reading this. And remember that there’s a poll at the end of every Friday edition. Today is no different!
Top stories 🚨
Bayeux Tapestry’s sensation return
The British Museum will display the Bayeux Tapestry in 2026, in an "extraordinary" loan that could be one of the museum's most popular exhibitions in its history.
The loan will be the first time the Tapestry will have returned to Britain in over 900 years. It’ll be displayed from September 2026 until July 2027.
In exchange for its trip, treasures from the British Museum's collection — including Sutton Hoo items and Lewis chess pieces — will travel to museums in Normandy, France.
The news was announced as part of French President Emmanuel Macron's state visit to the UK. The President joined Prime Minister Keir Starmer for an official signing ceremony at the museum on Wednesday. The venue saw a rare full-day closure to accommodate the event.
George Osborne, Chair of the British Museum Trustees, said it will be "THE blockbuster show of our generation" and compared it to the 1972 exhibition of Tutankhamun treasures which is by far the most popular show ever held at the museum, attracting 1.7m visitors. (Read more)
‘Raised eyebrows’ as V&A beaten to Bayeux
The V&A — who for many years believed they were in pole position to host the Bayeux Tapestry should it ever come to the UK — weren’t told about the deal to exhibit it at the British Museum.
Although President Macron had first announced an intention to loan the work to the Britain in 2018, plans were shelved amid deteriorating relations and concerns over the Tapestry’s condition.
By 2022 however, the V&A had signed deal with the Bayeux Museum in Normandy to lead a project on the Tapestry’s conservation. Director Tristram Hunt had even said Britain should foot the bill for restoration costs to secure its loan.
But in May, when France’s culture minister told her UK counterpart Chris Bryant she wanted Sutton Hoo treasures in return for the Tapestry, a deal was hatched to send it to the British Museum.
The V&A was kept in the dark. “Eyebrows were raised,” one anonymous V&A official revealed to the FT. (Read more)
🔗 EVEN MORE BAYEUX! ⤵
‘Momentous occasion’: how Bayeux Museum finally said yes to tapestry loan | Kim Willsher in the Guardian
Battle for Bayeux! A British Museum coup that’s one in the eye for the V&A | Richard Morrison in the Times
Macron makes Tapestry Brexit joke in address to Parliament during UK state visit | The Independent
Huge job cuts at National Trust
The National Trust is to axe 550 jobs after it blamed the government’s increases in staff costs for the need to find millions in savings.
The charity said Rachel Reeves’ Budget decisions to increase employer’s national insurance contributions and the minimum wage had resulted in a £10m rise in its staff costs, outstripping increases in income.
6% of its 11,000-strong workforce — the equivalent of 550 full-time jobs — will now be cut. It will affect frontline roles including staff working in cafes and shops, as well as conservation assistants. They are part of a wider £26m savings plan.
The National Trust said it would work with the Prospect union to “make the transition as painless as possible”. A union spokesperson said “We understand the cost pressures the trust is facing but management decisions, as well as external factors, have contributed to the financial situation and once again it is our members who will have to pay the price.” (Read more)
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UK news 🇬🇧
Truss trashes (not so) ‘secret’ Parthenon plans 🇬🇷
Short-lived former British prime minister Liz Truss and a hard-right lobby group have said they’ll take legal action over any plans to return the Parthenon Sculptures to Greece. They allege there’s a “covert negotiation” to remove them from the British Museum. (So covert they’ve been reported on extensively?!) The 34 signatories of the letter, addressed to Keir Starmer, Lisa Nandy and the museum’s trustees, also include historian Dr David Starkey. It also says “trustees may need to consider their position." (Read more)
Royal Observatory’s star makeover 🔭
The Royal Observatory — part of Royal Museums Greenwich — has unveiled plans for a £77m renovation to mark its 350th anniversary. Spearheaded by the architects behind the National Portrait Gallery revamp, there’ll be new galleries, new demo spaces, new landscaping and a whole new entrance. Work will begin in September with the aim to complete by 2028. (Read more)
Bradford’s Media Museum concludes overhaul 🎥
The £6.8 million transformation project of the National Science and Media Museum has been completed, with the opening of the overhauled permanent galleries. Sound and Vision displays over 500 objects from the Science Museum Group’s collection, including John Logie Baird’s experimental TV apparatus and the camera which captured the first moving images. “We’ve increased the number of objects we have on display three-fold” a curator said. (Read more)
Bristol beaten to Turner’s lost masterpiece ☹️
Efforts by Bristol Museum to buy a long-lost Turner painting were dashed when they were outbid at auction, despite raising three-times the work’s estimate. The museum’s £1m was not enough to beat the winning bidder — a private UK collector — who nabbed it for £1.9m, nearly eight times the estimate price. "It just wasn't our night" senior curator Kate Newnham said. "The response from the public has been simply extraordinary," she said after 1,700 donated to help them in their last-minute fundraising. (Read more)
Animal mummies remain wrapped for longer 😿
We’ll have to wait yet again for the British Museum’s long-planned animal mummies exhibition. The exciting show has been on the museum’s internal ‘potential’ future exhibition list for years. Finally given a slot, in December it was announced as opening Autumn 2026 in the museum’s Sainsbury gallery. But the Tapestry’s arrival has torpedoed that. A museum spokesperson couldn’t tell me a revised opening date, only that “our exhibition schedule will be adjusted to enable [the Tapestry’s] once in a lifetime show.” I suppose for ancient mummies, what’s one more year?
Global news 🌎
UAE 🇦🇪
The long-delayed Zayed National Museum in Abu Dhabi has confirmed it will finally open in December this year. First scheduled to welcome visitors from 2012, the mega museum designed by Norman Foster has been beset by continual delays. Confirming the new opening, the museum revealed star objects will include one of the world’s oldest natural pearls and and an 1,100-year-old Qur’an. (Read more)
France 🇫🇷
A vast retrospective of German artist Gerhard Richter will open this autumn at the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris. Bosses are calling it “exceptional…unmatched both in scale and in chronological scope.” It will feature 270 works stretching from 1962 to 2024, and will be co-curated by Nicholas Serota, the former director of Tate, who had organised a Richter show at Tate Modern in 2011. Like the current blockbuster Hockney show at the gallery, the exhibition will take up the entire space. (Read more)
Spain 🇪🇸
The world’s first museum of censored art — the Museu de l’Art Prohibit in Barcelona — has closed for good after just two years. The institution, which housed banned works by artists including Ai Weiwei, blamed financial losses suffered after union picketing. “The threats and slander resulting from this situation have disrupted the museum’s normal operation” a statement said. Union members had demanded an improvement in working conditions including more breaks and increased pay. (Read more)
France 🇫🇷
The Musée Guimet in Paris is being sued over its decision to rename its Nepal-Tibet gallery as ‘Himalayan world.’ Four pro-Tibetan group have accused the museum of wanting to "erase the existence of Tibet" and of wanting “to align itself with Chinese lobbying efforts." Bosses deny this, saying the move was meant to "highlight the richness of cultural interactions across this vast and complex region." (Read more)
News in brief 🗞️
It’s not a bag. It’s a Birkin.
The very first Birkin bag, produced for actor Jane Birkin by Hermès, has just sold for €8.6m (£7.4m) at auction. It’s now the most expensive handbag — and the second most-expensive fashion item — ever sold. (More)
Hirst’s artwork not spotted (for once)
A burglar stole £400,000 worth of items from Damien Hirst’s Thames-side studio in London, but failed to spot any of the artworks worth millions. Instead it was custom T shirts and trousers designed by the artist that were nabbed. (More)
Back at the museum after-hours
The Night at the Museum movie franchise is being rebooted, less than 20 years after the first film came out. Said to feature all new characters and a new story, the original three films grossed over $1bn at the global box office. (More)
One final mention of the British Museum!
And in other reboot news, the epic Civilisations is back. The BBC have released details of Civilisations: Rise and Fall, a follow up to the 2018 iteration of Kenneth Clark’s 1969 original. This time its a huge collaboration with the British Museum. (More)
How to welcome families in museums
What does it mean to be a fully family friendly attraction? Find out in this recent Arts & Culture podcast episode, where three experts discuss how to create truly great family experiences. (Listen here or on your favourite podcast platform)*
*This is sponsored
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👀 Last week’s most clicked news story
— Translucent bridge to form centrepiece of national memorial to Elizabeth II
📊 Last week’s poll results | How many news stories in this edition are you learning about for the first time FROM this newsletter?
— Every. Single. One! 35%
— 10 — 15 22%
— 5 — 10 19%
— Up to 5 24%
— None. I knew them all 0%
📊 This week’s poll
So! Much! News! I am already planning how to get tickets to the BM Bayeux Tapestry show. Their membership numbers are going to go through the roof