Members of the public will get a unique peek behind the scenes of Gladstone’s Library next month

Members of the public will be given a unique opportunity to go behind the scenes of Gladstone’s Library next month.

The doors of the stunning Grade 1 listed residential library in Hawarden will be thrown open for one day as part of Cadw, the Welsh Government’s historic environment service, ‘Open Doors’ festival.

Guided tours of the library’s secure store, which is usually closed off to the public, will take place on Saturday, 16th September.

The free, one hour curator-led tours will give visitors a unique insight into the library’s historic and distinctive collections and the man who founded them, W.E. Gladstone.

Gladstone’s Library secure store

Members of the public will go behind the scenes into Closed Access, the secure store where they will get up close to almost 6,000 items printed before 1800, some dating from the early 16th Century.

“You really do get to see behind closed doors at our Open Doors event.” said Librarian Gary Butler, who will be leading the tours.

Visitors will see Closed Access, where we keep all of our rarest items, and the items on display are some of the stars of our collection, so don’t miss this opportunity to learn more about the wonderful collections we have here, and why books and libraries remain so important to us all.” Gary added.

Gladstone’s Library is the only Prime Ministerial library in the U.K, it is also one of the finest research libraries in the country with a collection of around 150,000 printed items, some date from the 15th century.

Galdstone’s Marketing Manager Amy Sumner told Deeside.com

“Gladstone’s Library welcomes the annual Open Doors celebration and is delighted to be taking part in this excellent initiative from Cadw for another year.

It is so important to us to encourage access to our invaluable collections and to open our doors to people who may otherwise never have considered visiting.

We hope that everyone who steps through these doors will take something away from their visit, be that returning visitors who stumble across something new or first-time guests who become regular friends.”

The 60-minute Curator-led tours of the library will take place at 12pm, 2pm and 4pm on Saturday, 16th September and bookings are required.

Tours are limited to 35 people, though books will be on display throughout the day for visitors.

Due to the historic fabric of the building, not all parts of the library or the Open Doors tour are accessible to wheelchair users.

To find out more about Open Doors click here.

To book a tour call 01244 532350 or email enquiries@gladlib.org