A new micro museum is opening in one of Liverpool’s smallest historic buildings

Hartley Hut is one of three granite buildings on the riverfront, dating back to 1844, which were used as a shelter for dockworkers around the nearby Canning Half Tide Dock.

Sited between the Museum of Liverpool and Royal Albert Dock, the tiny octagonal buildings originally provided protection from the elements for dock gatemen. Since it was no longer in operation, Hartley Hut has only been accessible on Heritage Open Days, but now it’s preparing to open six days a week, giving people a glimpse into what it was like to work on the waterfront when it was key to the city’s maritime trade.

Visitors will be able to hear real accounts of what life was like as a dock gateman as well as seeing some of the quirkiness of the hut’s design.

What they lack in size, the Hartley Huts make up for in historic credentials – they were a part of civil engineer Jesse Hartley’s initial plans for the Albert Dock.

Hartley, who was responsible for the building and modernising of Liverpool’s entire dock network in the mid-1800s, took inspiration for the design of the little gatehouses from ancient Greece.

He used ‘Cyclopean’ stonework, which is still intact today, named as a reference to the huge scale of the stone blocks which it was said would have been best handled by the mythical giants, the Cyclops.

All three of the huts still survive, but only one is owned by National Museums Liverpool and that is undergoing a sensitive refurbishment as part of NML’s wider Waterfront Transformation Project.

Due to open later this year, along with the personal spoken memories, Hartley Hut will also contain an original artwork created specifically for the attraction.

A spokesperson for NML explains:

“A special new feature of the hut will be a commissioned artwork with connections to the history of the site to hang above the fireplace. 

“We had a great response to a call-out to artists to create a ceramic-based installation, making use of pottery fragments which were found during the archeological dig on the reclaimed land Museum of  Liverpool now sits on.”

With the Maritime Museum and International Slavery Museum currently closed for maintenance and repair ahead of redevelopment, NML says Hartley Hut is likely to be a popular extra attraction for visitors to the waterfront.

“People will have walked past it for decades and probably known nothing about it but it’s actually an incredible little place. There’s a huge amount of architectural beauty in the building.

“Museum of Liverpool has had such a surge in visitors since the temporary closure of the Maritime Museum and International Slavery Museum so there’s a whole new audience around that area.

“People will be coming across these buildings who might not have noticed them before – visitors don’t always combine the two areas even though they’re next to each other – so it will be another attraction for the waterfront that we’re excited to have.

“The Great Port gallery in the Museum of Liverpool is all about the Port City and the conditions and the people who worked on the port so it’s a really great connection to that too.” 

Find out more on the Liverpool Museums website.

Find out what else you can get up to across Liverpool here.

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