Plans included improving visitor access and facilities, new gallery displays, and restoration of parts of the historic building.

The Horniman Museum and Gardens opened in 1901 as a gift to the people in perpetuity from tea trader and philanthropist Frederick John Horniman to ‘bring the world to Forest Hill’. Today the Horniman has a collection of 350,000 objects, specimens and artefacts from around the world. Its galleries include natural history, anthropology, music and an acclaimed acquarium.

It is recognised as a major international centre for the study of musical instruments, having a collection of around 6,000 objects. The Ethnography collection is one of the most important collections outside the national museums sector, with around 60,000 objects representing cultures around the world.

The project was designed to increase access to a greater proportion of these collections, including over 75% more of the musical instrument collection and an extra 1,800 objects from the ethnography collection. Plans included improving visitor routes around the museum, and new displays to improve understanding of the collections.