What is the Leach Pottery Capital Development?
The Leach Pottery in St Ives, Cornwall was founded by the renowned potters Bernard Leach and Shōji Hamada in 1920. Today the site supports 13 buildings including two Grade II listed buildings, the original home and workplace of Bernard Leach. The site also incorporates a museum, pottery shop, active pottery studio, learning and workshop spaces, temporary exhibition space and residency accommodation.
Now run by the Bernard Leach (St Ives) Charitable Trust Ltd, it is a living heritage asset, supporting and promoting a thriving network of studio potters across the globe, maintaining the legacy of Standard Ware production, it also runs internationally recognised learning, apprenticeship and residency programmes.
In recent years there has been a growing vision and ambition to further expand and diversify activities, to provide better community links, and to improve sustainability.
Why are we doing it?
The capital programme intends to protect the museum’s Grade II historic buildings, upgrade services, reduce carbon emissions, improve accessibility (physical and intellectual), and ensure financial resilience.
It will create a community hub by refining and targeting engagement programmes for local people, while providing more training and employment opportunities contributing to the town’s wider regeneration plans.
What are the improvements?
The project will involve changes and additions to the whole site. This includes:
Provide a new studio and education building on the site of the current Beagle Cross house that will house a new production pottery, new learning facilities and new staff facilities.
Refurbish and improve the existing museum (the listed Leach Pottery) to include conversion of part of the 2008 production studio into an introductory gallery to enable the context and importance of Leach to be fully explored.
Convert the 2008 Cube gallery into an archive study centre with a library, object store and archive.
Provide a new reception and cafe buildings, selling gallery and improvements to shop.
Return the first floor of the listed Pottery Cottage to residential use for visiting artists.
What will the improvements mean?
A new pottery that will increase pottery production
Increase in training apprenticeships
Increase in the learning programme
Reduction in our carbon footprint
Preserving the site for future generations
Maintaining the future viability of the Leach Pottery
Creating a community hub
How much is it going to cost?
The total cost of the project is £8.9 million.
The Leach Pottery is a community asset held in trust by Cornwall Council with a long term lease to the charity that runs the pottery. Investing in the Leach Pottery site will be investing in the cultural heritage of Cornwall and its community. These costs are split between:
Building the new studio and learning spaces: £4.5 million
Restoring the listed buildings & creating a new entrance/café: £3.2 million
Developing new interpretation for the museum: £700K
Local community 3 year programme: £500K
Who is funding it?
The funding has come from several sources. These include the Town Deal programme, which received £19.9 million from the Government’s Towns Fund Scheme. The money is funding a range of projects in the town designed to improve facilities for the local community. We have also received money from the National Lottery Heritage Fund.
You can find out more about the Team Deal and the other programmes that are being funded here.
The funding breaks down:
We have received £5m from Town Deal
We have investment interest from the Arts Council and National Lottery Heritage Fund.
Why do we need it?
The Leach Pottery has stood on the same site for more than a century. The pottery, a learning centre, museum, shop and gallery space are housed in a total of 13 buildings, with the original pottery dating back to the 1920s. Additional buildings have been added in the 1950s and 1970s including a converted house now used for learning, and most recently, the museum reception entrance, the Cube gallery, and the Leach studio workshop in 2008.
Many of these buildings are no longer fit for purpose and impede our efforts to expand our world-class pottery and learning scheme.
Is it just for tourists?
No. More than half of the funding has come from a pot of money designed to improve the local community. Our funding partners St Ives Town Deal have developed their programme with a vision:
“Our overall vision and strategy for St Ives has been developed by local communities and businesses. Our vision has been driven by local people.”
There will be a programme of activities to serve our local community with emphasis on our immediate neighbours, the town where we are based and the region. The Pottery offers courses and workshops for local people, schools and groups each year.
The new pottery will also include a café open to the local community.
How long is it going to take?
Enabling works are set to begin on the site in early 2024. Work will continue around the site for two years with completion planned for Summer 2026*. You can find a timetable of the work here.
Is it going to mean disruption and noise?
We understand that building work can be disruptive to local people we are committed to minimising the disruption, along with the people we work with. As part of these efforts, there will be timed deliveries and work on-site during working hours.
The first work begins in early 2024, when pipework currently located under the site needs to be moved to the road outside. This which will mean temporary roadworks.
We want to keep local people up to date as work progresse, if you want regular updates join our mailing list here.
Will the site close?
The capital project will allow us to continue with some work onsite, but some areas will close or move off-site during the development work.
Can I still visit the museum?
The museum is expected to close in August 2025 and the new extended museum will reopen in *April 2026. You can see our plans for the museum here.
The new-look museum is being developed through our Interpretation Project which is consulting on ideas for how our story should be told.
Can I still visit the shop and buy pottery?
Yes. The shop will close for a period of time during the work in the Spring 2025, you can still buy work on our online shop here. The new-look shop is expected to open in April 2026*
Can I still sign up for pottery courses?
Yes, the learning team will continue to provide the full range of learning and workshops, although some of it will happen in new venues in Cornwall until the new extended learning centre is finished. Read more about current courses here.
The learning facility moves into its purpose-built home in Autumn 2025*.
Will the pottery studio pottery remain open?
The studio where pottery is made will move into its new purpose-built larger studio in September 2026*.
During the capital project building work, the studio and kilns will move into temporary accommodation, but production will be uninterrupted.
What will it look like?
We are working with Dones Jones Architects and interpretation and exhibition designers Imagemakers Design & Consultancy Ltd to develop the details of the site.
As the designs develop we will be updating our development gallery here.
What are the environmental considerations?
The project is designed to be socially and environmentally sustainable.
Our low carbon heating strategies will reduce operational costs and meet our aims to become carbon neutral by 2030.
The insulation and low-level air-to-air heating in addition to maintaining a stable ambient temperature in accordance with our Conservation and Management and Maintenance plans, will mean staff, volunteers, demonstrators and resident potters engaging with the public throughout the historic buildings will be housed in considerably more comfort than they currently are.
Where can I find out more?
You can see our full planning applications on our website which has the Phase One and Phase Two applications in full. Or you can search the Cornwall Council planning register using the reference PA23/00676.
We will be updating details on the website in the coming weeks and months, you can also join us on social media and sign up to our newsletter here. #LeachNext100
*Dates are approximate and subject to some change