Our temporary home: Hansom Hall

Due to building work at the Leicester Museum and Art Gallery (a new café area and a 180 degree re-orientation of the Central Gallery) our concert venue is the historic Hansom Hall in Belvoir Street, once adjacent to the main library and now part of the Leicester Adult Education College.

Built by Joseph Hansom of Hansom cab fame, 1845, this former Baptist chapel is owned by Leicester City Council. It is reputed to have hosted concerts by both Franz Liszt and Ignacy Jan Paderewski.

In 2014, £250k was spent on the building to open it up as an Arts Centre, complete with café/bar. It reopened in January 2015.

You will be pleased to hear that our wonderful Steinway Model D, much admired by visiting pianists, has moved with us to our new venue

find us

Our regular home: Leicester Museum and Art Gallery

address

Hansom Hall

Leicester Adult Education College, 50-54 Belvoir St, Leicester LE1 6QL

New Walk is a leafy pedestrian way leading from Leicester city centre to Victoria Park. Laid out in the early 19th Century, New Walk is unique in English urban planning. The Museum was originally built as a school, but was converted into a museum in 1849, since when the building has undergone a number of revisions. There is an interesting display showing these adjacent to the café. Nicholas Pevsner described the entrance as a ‘dignified, somewhat heavy four-column portico of giant Tuscan columns’.

The centrepiece of the Museum’s possessions is a significant collection of Victorian Art housed in the splendid newly refurbished main gallery. New Walk Museum also has an important collection of German Expressionist paintings and a unique display of Picasso ceramics gifted to the Museum by the late Lord Attenborough. There are always interesting temporary exhibitions to see too.

The Central Gallery, with its excellent acoustic and Steinway grand piano, has hosted some of the UK’s finest classical chamber musicians. An annual season of Lunchtime Concerts, presented in association with Leicester Museums, has completed in excess of 80 years and the more recent Leicester International Music Festival has now taken place for more than thirty.

The Festival attracts outstanding international musicians and is now one of the UK’s leading festivals of classical chamber music.

 

Access

  • automatic doors

  • external and internal ramps/lift

  • disabled toilets on ground floor

  • guide dogs welcome (please specify when booking)

  • wheelchair spaces available: can be reserved with a complimentary seat for a carer (please specify when booking and leave contact details in order for us to provide the best possible experience)