A museum has received a “very generous” donation to update its archaeological display.

Maidstone Museum in St Faith’s Street is run by Maidstone Borough Council (MBC) and, earlier this year, it was allocated £389,000 in the council’s budget.

In April, the council was presented with four options to spend the money, with councillors choosing to renovate the museum’s British Archaeological Gallery.

The museum claims to have the largest British archaeological collection in Kent, with around 11,000 artefacts from prehistoric to medieval times.

Funds will come from both the council and additional funding from the Maidstone Museum Foundation (MMF).

However, since April, the William and Edith Oldham Trust has offered to match funding from the MMF up to £100,000 to update the gallery.

MBC's economic regeneration and leisure committee met on Tuesday to formally decide where the money should be spent.

"I think the ability for people outside the town to access this gallery would be very beneficial..."

Maidstone Museum director Victoria Barlow said: “We have received a formal offer of financial support from the William and Edith Oldham Trust, whereby each pound raised locally by the Maidstone Museum Foundation will be matched by the Trust.

“That’s a very generous offer and I know that the foundation are up for the challenge.

“The reason to update this gallery was to provide a vastly-improved telling of the first part of Maidstone’s story, which covers the pre-history stone age up until the late Medieval period in the 1500s - that’s about 5,000 years of our history.”

All councillors wanted to see improvements to the museum but Cllr Martin Cox emphasised making the museum more accessible, saying: “I would like us as much as possible to future proof the museum, and we’ve made reference to digitising collections, and I want that to be a reasonably big percentage.

“I think the ability for people outside the town to access this gallery would be very beneficial.

“What’s been put before us tonight is very good, let’s get going with developing this gallery, because we’ve got to remember we are the County Town’s museum and this gallery is going to hold artefacts from not just Maidstone but probably all round the county.”

Councillors voted unanimously to approve the renovations of the museum.

Council officers will return in February 2022 with a more detailed plan of what the display will look like.

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