Various roles

Founded in 1932, the Bridport Museum Trust comprises Bridport Museum in a beautiful, listed building on South Street; the collections store and the local history centre. It has a wonderful collection covering the social and economic history of Bridport and its surrounding villages, with a rope and net collection of national significance. The Trust relies on a dedicated and talented cohort of around 60 volunteers who contribute their ideas, time and energy to make the museum and archives available to the community and visitors for enjoyment, education and inspiration.

Bridport Museum Trust is delighted to have secured a significant funding award from the National Lottery Heritage Fund to support our project ‘Re-imagining Bridport Museum for its Centenary’. In preparation for its landmark centenary in 2032, this exciting project will re-imagine the museum, its collections and how it can best serve its community.

Project Manager

We now wish to appoint an experienced project manager to play a pivotal role in delivering this project. The successful consultant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, and other freelancers and consultants appointed to the project, including an architect, audience development consultant, business planning consultant, fundraising officer, freelance curator and evaluation consultant (this latter role on evaluation will directly report to the Project Manager).

It is likely that the number of days required per month will vary depending on activity and reporting schedules, with significant input required at the start and end of the project, including a major milestone for a ‘go/no go’ decision in July 2026.

• Total fee: £30,000 including travel, subsistence and expenses
• Contract: Freelance contract

Collections Manager

Significant collections work has been undertaken by the dynamic team at Bridport Museum Trust. Between 2019 and 2023 we carried out a community collections review project (The Right Stuff), which helped us understand what people valued about our collections, and identified potential material for rationalisation.

The next phase of this project is to implement the outcomes of the review through the ‘Reimaging’ project.

Our aspirations to improve collections care, access, and development are threads that connect all aspects of this project. The museum has been exploring developing digital access to its collections, and the ‘Reimagining’ project will work to create a digitisation strategy for the museum.

You will build on a solid foundation of work from the Right Stuff project and have the opportunity to make a real difference as we reimagine the museum for the coming century.

• Salary: £14,400 p.a. (£30,000 FTE)
• Contract: 18-month fixed term, part-time contract 18 hours a week

Fundraising Officer

Bridport Museum Trust wishes to appoint an experienced fundraising officer to help deliver our project ‘Re-imagining Bridport Museum for its Centenary’. The successful applicant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, the project manager and other consultants appointed to the project.

As Fundraising Officer, your work will focus on generating income and developing relationships with new and existing stakeholders. Reporting to the Museum Manager, you will be responsible for developing and implementing a fundraising strategy and subsequent campaigns, including grant applications and research into commercial opportunities.

• Salary: £8,960 p.a. (£28,000 FTE)
• Contract: 12-month fixed term, part-time contract 12 hours a week

Architect

Bridport Museum Trust now wishes to appoint an experienced architect to help deliver our project. The successful consultant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, the project manager and other consultants appointed to the project, including an audience development consultant, business planning consultant, fundraising officer and evaluation consultant including a major milestone for a ‘go/no go’ decision in July 2026.

The architect will play a strategic role in helping the Board to understand how the Museum can successfully reduce its footprint from three sites to two, enabling staff and volunteers to vacate rented space in The Grove during 2027 and The Coach House during 2028. You will produce a Feasibility Study which models the Museum’s future operations across the Museum building on South Street and the Bridport LSI, providing an outline scheme design and budget from which the Board will be able to better understand the financial implications of acquiring the LSI.

• Total fee: up to £10,000 including travel, subsistence and expenses
• Contract: Freelance contract

Business planning consultant

Bridport Museum Trust wishes to appoint an experienced business planning consultant to help deliver our project ‘Re-imagining Bridport Museum for its Centenary’. The successful consultant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, the project manager and other consultants appointed to the project, including an architect, audience development consultant, fundraising officer and evaluation consultant.

The consultant will scope out projections for our future business model based on two scenarios: the status quo and the replacement of The Coach House site with Bridport LSI. The first stage output will be an appraisal of these two options, including a robust financial risk assessment, and will help to inform the board decision (likely to be made July 2026). Based on the board decision, the consultant will then work closely with the Museum Manager and Trustees to develop a new 5 year business plan designed to reduce our reliance on local authority funding and support us in operating a balanced budget.

• Total fee: up to £8,000 including travel, subsistence and expenses
• Contract: Freelance contract

Audience Development Consultant

Bridport Museum Trust wishes to appoint an experienced audience development consultant to help deliver our project ‘Reimagining Bridport Museum for its Centenary’. The successful consultant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, the project manager and other consultants appointed to the project, including an architect, business planning consultant, fundraising officer and evaluation consultant.

The audience development consultant will play a key role in helping the Board to understand how the Museum can successfully reduce its footprint from three sites to two, enabling staff and volunteers to vacate rented space in The Grove during 2027 and The Coach House during 2028. They will produce an Audience Development Plan based on extensive consultation with current visitors, non-users and potential partners which will inform the work being undertaken in parallel by the Architect and Business Planning Consultant, and the Museum’s future plans more broadly.

• Total fee: up to £14,000 including travel, subsistence and expenses
• Contract: Freelance contract

Freelance Curator

Bridport Museum Trust wishes to appoint a freelance curator to help deliver our project ‘Re-imagining Bridport Museum for its Centenary’. The successful applicant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, and the project manager and evaluation consultant appointed to the project.

Ideally we would like this to be an opportunity for an emerging curator to gain valuable experience of curating exhibitions and events in an Accredited Museum. We would ideally like to support practitioners in the region with these Heritage Fund supported opportunities, so applications from those based in the South West are particularly welcomed.

The freelance curator will provide additional capacity to the Museum team to support a programme of activity based around the acquisition of three paintings by artist Francis Henry Newbery (1855-1946).

• Total fee: up to £3,000 including travel, subsistence and expenses
• Contract: Freelance contract

Evaluation Consultant

Bridport Museum Trust wishes to appoint an experienced evaluation consultant to help deliver our project ‘Re-imagining
Bridport Museum for its Centenary’. The successful consultant will work closely with staff and Trustees at the Museum, the project manager and other consultants appointed to the project, including an architect, audience development consultant, business planning consultant and fundraising officer.

Working closely with the Museum Manager and Project Manager, the Evaluation Consultant will lead on evaluation of the project, measuring the impact, benefits, legacy and social value of National Lottery investment, in accordance with National Lottery Heritage Fund good practice guidance. Our ambition is for Bridport Museum to be one of the organisations that pilots the social value framework developed by Historic England and academics, and the consultant will also be expected to take this into consideration.

• Total fee: up to £6,000 including travel, subsistence and expenses
• Contract: Freelance contract

How to apply

Click here for more details on the above roles (opens in a new tab)

Applications  for the above roles must be submitted by email to  trustees@bridportmuseum.co.uk by 5pm on 4 February 2026. Please read the full job description or job brief before applying for full details of the application process. 

The ‘Reimagining Bridport Museum for its Centenary’ project is made possible with the National Lottery Heritage Fund. We have been able to fund these role thanks to National Lottery players.