Sainsbury Wing Reopening

Fabulous reopening of the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery after a two year closure.

I think this has long been my favourite bit of the gallery and it’s felt horrible having it closed for so long. It’s also made the rest of the gallery feel cramped. However it’s been well worth the wait.

The foyer has been opened up with sections taken out of the floor above to create curved, double storey views and to let it light. More light is also coming from having taken the darkened glass out of the huge windows which run up the stairs.

In the foyer is an upmarket coffee bar, which was coping well on members’ day when I went but it might struggle when the crowds arrive as it’s the first coffee stop they’ll see. However the £4.80 price of a coffee might put them off.

On the first floor is a posh new restaurant and the book shop which I was worried had disappeared. It’s almost purely about books and has a great selection of old and new titles.

I then popped up the picture galleries which were looking wonderful. I’ll talk about the complete rehang of the gallery in another post but I’ll just say here that the original idea that the lay out in this section is like a church has been played up to and there is clever use of a darker grey wall colour in areas associated with domestic art or where they want to show off the gold work.

Finally I went to a lecture in the refurbished lecture theatre and it’s a lovely shade of blue and still smelt of new carpet.

I have to mention the excellent new toilets too both on floors 1 and -1. The -1 ones had moved which threw me a bit!

I can’t wait for the rest to reopen particularly the old exhibition space and the new members’ room.

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