Covid-19 News : Update
When visiting, you MUST use the hand sanitiser provided and fill out our visitor information form. This is MANDATORY. We have a Covid specific GDPR policy in place for the short term collection of visitors data.
Visitors to the Museum must wear a face covering.
Please help us to keep you and our volunteers safe.
Please keep a social distance from our volunteers.
Various aspects of the Museum will be cleaned following each group visit. Some parts of the Museum will be closed for the time being.
If you feel any symptons of Covid-19 please stay away. We can only open the Museum if we all stay sensible and follow the guidance.
New Shop stock for 2020
We've changed our shop layout for 2020 with the display of items rationalised to show samples only.
Items you wish to buy will be taken from stock and given to you in a bag.
Benjamin Britten & Peter Pears
Britten Pears Arts has an extensive archive available to view at the Red House and also online.
They have kindly allowed us access to their collection, particularly concerning the invoices and receipts from Saxmundham businesses.
This gives us an insight into how many local businesses provided services to Britten and Pears but also most are no longer trading.
Two that are still here include H. G. Crisp and Flick & son, although both now under different ownership.
One particular story that comes out concerns Benjamin Britten's ownership of a 1957 Jensen interceptor covertable. Car dealers Smith and Wesby undertook several works on the car to fix rain water ingress and a petrol leak. By 1960 Britten had obviously grown tired of all the repair work and traded the Jensen in for a Mercedes instead!
Who remembers the local vets as "Downie & Fishwick", later to become "Fishwick, Hill and Button"?
We will have a new display, once the Museum is open, but here is a link to see what it will be like.
Spring Newsletter
Click on the image below to open the file.
Quiz Night 2020
Thank you to everyone who came to the Quiz night. Special thanks to those who donated a prize for the raffle, including ..
The Bell, Christies Care, Fisher Home Hardware, Get Stuffed, The George Farnham Gallery, HSBC Bank, Jeffrey and Associates Opticians, Sax Velo, Snape Maltings, The Store, Tesco.
