Shakespeare Museum to Open in London in Spring 2024

A new museum dedicated to William Shakespeare will open in London's Shoreditch district in spring 2024. The museum is built around the archaeological site of the Curtain Playhouse, one of the city's earliest theaters, discovered by the Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) during excavations from 2011 to 2016. The Curtain was a rectangular building with a 14-meter-long stage, seating about 1,400 people, and hosted premieres of Henry V and likely Romeo and Juliet. The museum will display artifacts such as a bird whistle for sound effects, ceramic piggy banks, buttons, clay pipes, pins, coins, and nutshells. It is part of the Stage development by Cain International, a commercial project with apartments, offices, and shops. The museum will feature a reconstruction of the original theater using AI projections with images, smells, and sounds of 16th-century London, created by Bompas & Parr in collaboration with Historic England, MOLA, and Shakespearean theater experts. The Curtain Playhouse was lost after the 1620s; its exact location was rediscovered thanks to an old street sign. After the theater's decline, a Victorian pub and surrounding buildings preserved the site as open ground. The museum will explain the theater's history within London's social context, with a path through the stage foundations and gravel courtyard.