Mary Rose appeal for 'crew'

An artist's impression of what the new Mary Rose Museum will look like. © Wilkinson Eyre Architects.

Previously unseen artefacts recovered from Henry VIII’s flagship have been put on show by the Mary Rose Trust as part of a public appeal to help fund an ambitious new £35 million museum project. The items include a fiddle complete with its bow, believed to be the oldest example in Europe, a beautifully preserved leather ‘manbag’, once the height of Tudor fashion, and the giant wooden spoon used to stir the crew’s porridge pot. All these items and many more are hidden away in the Mary Rose’s reserve collection due to a lack of display space. To mark the 500th anniversary year of King Henry VIII’s accession to the throne, the Mary Rose Trust has launched 'The Mary Rose 500 Public Appeal' (www.maryrose500.org) with the aim of recruiting 500 individuals, schools, businesses and organisations to come on board and symbolically become the ‘new crew’ of this famous Tudor warship.

Never before seen Tudor 'manbag', once the height of fashion, found on board the Mary Rose.

Each new crew member will pledge to raise at least £500 towards the cost of the new Mary Rose Museum, which is scheduled to open in time for the London Olympics in 2012. £21m is coming from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), with the Mary Rose Trust having to raise another £14 million to complete the project. Although the ship hall is temporarily closed, during the construction of the new museum, the existing Mary Rose Museum in Portsmouth's Historic Dockyard (www.historicdockyard.co.uk), located separately, is remaining open during the construction period (10am–4pm last admission, close 5.30pm), admission prices for a single adult and families vary, starting from £12.50 per single attraction visit.

22 October 2009