Foundling Museum

Overview

Formerly the Foundling Hospital - set up in 1739 by Thomas Coram to house children who often had to be abandoned due to extreme poverty.

The museum tells that story and also has a large collection of artworks - the hospital raised funds by becoming the city’s first public art gallery.

Area
Bloomsbury
Price
£12.75 - Under 21s free
Website
foundlingmuseum.org.uk
Hours
Mon
Closed
Tue-Sat
10:00 – 17:00
Sun
11:00 - 17:00
The museum: A terraced house with a bright red door.
Photo by me.

Related Attractions

Handel Hendrix House

Located in Mayfair

Handel, enormously famous in his day, was a key benefactor of the Foundling Hospital and there’s a gallery dedicated to some of his works on the museum’s top floor.

His house in Mayfair is also a museum and has more in common with the Foundling Museum than you’d expect, both can reveal stories of everyday life in Georgian London for the richest and the poorest. Make sure you talk to the volunteers though! There’s not much to read.

Photo of a musical instrument with a landscape oil painting behind it against a grey panelled wall.
Photo by me. Handel clearly liked grey.

Exhibitions

Foundling Voices 

Until
Included in entry

Learn about five individuals grappling with their identities due to unknown family backgrounds through personal stories and oral histories.

Self-Made: Reshaping Identities 

Begins
Included in entry

An exhibition featuring ceramic works by four artists examining the fluid nature of identity through the transformative properties of clay.