The Ancient House
Clare Ancient House is a Grade I Listed Building and is recognised as having national importance. The West wing, on the High Street, is believed to date from the 14th century, and the more heavily decorated East wing may have been built in 1473, the date which appears in the plasterwork of the house. It is first mentioned in a will of 1502, which refers to the new and the old parts.
The House was given to the town of Clare in 1938 by a local businessman Charles Byford, to be put to a useful public purpose. In 1979, a museum was established. Subsequently, with the help of grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund and St Edmundsbury District Council the Town Council entered into a partnership with Landmark Trust which took a lease of the building and carried out the required renovation of the whole building in exchange for a lease of part of it. The museum was entirely re-designed, and re-opened in 1999. The Museum is run by volunteers and its trustees.
Contact the Museum by email at info@clare-ancient-house-museum.co.uk for reference questions and further information.
The Ancient House Museum is open from Saturday 4th April to Sunday 27th September on Saturdays, Sundays and Bank Holidays from 12.00 to 16.00. We have a permanent exhibition about Clare’s early important history and involvement with Magna Carta. We also have a rolling exhibition which changes annually and which this year is called Unearthed: What Time Left Behind, a display of many of the interesting objects found in Clare by archaeological digs in the Castle, workers constructing the railway in the 1860s, metal detectorists and residents of Clare.
Entry is free. There is wheelchair access.