Sudley House Museum and Art Gallery is certainly a “hidden gem”. The building is situated in Mossley Hill a leafy suburb of Liverpool, which still has a number of large early Victorian properties set back from the road.
To avoid the Bank Holiday traffic we travelled by train on the Northern Line between Liverpool and Manchester alighting at Mossley Hill, where there is an accessible ramp for wheelchair users. From there it is a short walk to Sudley House. There are also buses to and from the city centre.
The main entrance to the house is accessed via a ramp and there is a lift between all the floors. You can borrow a wheelchair from the information desk and there are accessible toilets.
We had tea and cakes in the cafe before starting our tour around. There is a small range of books and postcards available to buy.
The house was built for a Victorian merchant with many typical features and also it is housing the only surviving art collection still hanging in its original location. There are classic paintings by such artists as Turner, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Burne-Jones, Rossetti and Millais to name but a few. There are displays of costume and toys that had belonged to upper class children. Some of the usual paintings will be on tour to Japan this summer, but other high class ones will be coming out of storage.
Before returning to the railway station we stopped off at Pi in Rose Lane for a pint of real ale from a selection of 12 on draught. It had to be done!
