Paddy Rodgers, director of the Royal Museums Greenwich, said: “This is the sort of treasure that we want to make sure people can access, to understand a little bit more about the work that is done here.
“We also want to bring joy to people and deliver on the original remit of the observatory, to improve the public understanding of astronomy.”
Mr Rodgers said he hoped the First Light project would “give people the opportunity to have their curiosity sparked” like his daughter had, who first visited the observatory aged 13 and recently completed a masters in physics and astrophysics.