{"id":371430,"date":"2026-04-09T15:53:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T15:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/371430\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T15:53:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T15:53:10","slug":"discovery-museum-and-laing-art-gallery-set-for-safety-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/371430\/","title":{"rendered":"Discovery Museum and Laing Art Gallery set for safety work"},"content":{"rendered":"

A council spokesperson said: “A recent inspection by us, highlighted urgent work that needed carrying out to keep the buildings open.”<\/p>\n

At the Laing, the public lift needs improved wheelchair access while the goods lift will be moved.<\/p>\n

“Both the Laing Art Gallery and Discovery Museum are among the city’s finest free cultural assets and are increasingly popular among visitors,” the spokesperson added.<\/p>\n

“This [work] will keep them safe for visitors and compliant with legislation while safeguarding their futures.”<\/p>\n

Significant restoration work recently began at the Discovery Museum, based in the Grade II listed Blandford House on Blandford Square.<\/p>\n

There have long been concerns about the state of the building, which houses treasures such as Charles Parsons’ Turbinia – the first ship to be powered by steam turbines and once the fastest vessel in the world.<\/p>\n

Bosses warned in 2022 the venue was in a “serious state of decline”, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More than \u00a33m in government funding was secured to replace the roof, with work scheduled to be completed by spring next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A council spokesperson said: “A recent inspection by us, highlighted urgent work that needed carrying out to keep…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":371431,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[442,498,499,500,501,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-371430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/371431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=371430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=371430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}