Tucked away in an old town hall on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales, many people may have walked past the Craven Museum without realising it existed.
Now, thanks to a multimillion pound restoration and a council that has bucked the trend for cutting arts funding, the tiny institution is up against much bigger competition for the Art Fund Museum of the Year award.
The Craven Museum, which employs only 10 full-time staff in the market town of Skipton, has been shortlisted for the world’s largest museum prize alongside cultural titans such as London’s National Portrait Gallery and the Young V&A.
“We were absolutely stunned,” said Danielle Daglan, the head of culture and archives at North Yorkshire council. “We thought it was going to be a ‘thanks but no thanks’.”
The Craven’s rise from obscurity began 20 years ago when an expert discovered that it had been storing one of Shakespeare’s First Folios in a backroom cupboard beneath a sink.
Curators thought the dusty document was a Second Folio but it was contacted in 2003 by Dr Anthony West, a Shakespeare expert, who confirmed that it was in fact one of only 235 surviving copies, published in 1623.
“The reaction was: ‘Oh my God.’ Get it out from under the sink and insure it,” said Daglan, who joined the museum later. It now takes pride of place in a climate-controlled cabinet, one of only four First Folios on permanent display in the UK.
The Craven reopened in 2021 after the renovation of Skipton town hall, which has been transformed from an unloved 160-year-old building into the heart of the community.
The museum has also reversed the national trend by benefiting from an increase in local authority funding, up £50,000 since 2017.
Daglan said North Yorkshire council recognised the value of investing in culture as a way to improve local wellbeing and reduce the strain on social care.
The town hall now hosts mental health support groups, weight-management classes, school visits, concerts, weddings and a weekly “knit and natter” night.
What was until recently a “decrepit, dilapidated” old building was once again a vital local hub, said Daglan: “It’s not always the bottom line figure, it’s the cost of not doing it.”
Sharon Heal, the director of the Museums Association, said local authority spending on museum and galleries had fallen 27% since 2010, from £426m to £311m, as a result of government cuts.
Heal said civic museums were “facing an existential crisis” with many in a state of “managed decline”. Research by Birkbeck, University of London, suggests at least 467 museums have closed in the UK since 2000, of which 145 were run by local authorities.
Visitor numbers for the Craven have increased from 60,000 a year to 160,000 since it reopened in 2021.
Now the tiny gallery, which has an annual budget of about £650,000, is up against the National Portrait Gallery (most recent income: £28m) for the world’s largest museum prize.
If it wins, Yorkshire venues will have won museum of the year as many times as London in the past decade.
Wakefield’s Yorkshire Sculpture Park and the Hepworth won the title in 2014 and 2017 respectively, while London’s V&A, the South London Gallery and Horniman Museum have taken the prize in the past 10 years.
Jenny Waldman, the director of the Art Fund, said the Craven was a “small museum thinking big” and a “fantastic example” of a local authority investing in culture “and it really shows”.
Other venues on the shortlist are the Manchester Museum and Dundee Contemporary Arts. The winning museum will be awarded £120,000 at a ceremony at the National Gallery in London on 10 July, while the runners-up will each receive £15,000.
• This article was amended on 3 May 2024 to give the full name of the award: the Art Fund Museum of the Year.
