Congratulations to Manchester Art Gallery!
Manchester Art Gallery has been named as one of the best tourist attractions in the country.
The city centre gallery won the silver award in the Large Visitor Attraction of the Year category of this year’s Enjoy England Awards for Excellence.
Manchester Art Gallery, based on Mosley Street, lost out to Chatsworth House in Derbyshire, but was the only free attraction to make it into the finals.
The prestigious prize was scooped after the gallery won in the same category at the England’s Northwest tourism awards last year.
Judges were impressed by recent work to help attract families to the gallery, such as introducing weekend drop-in activities, refurbishing the interactive gallery, and building a separate family information point.
They were also impressed by work to make the gallery more environmentally friendly by introducing low energy LED lighting throughout – saving 288 tonnes of carbon emissions per year.
The gallery reopened in 2002 following a £35m expansion project, and now attracts around 400,000 people a year – more than a tenth of which come from overseas - thanks to shows featuring artists ranging from Holman Hunt and Leonardo da Vinci to contemporary artists such as Grayson Perry.
The centre is currently exhibiting new work by Turner prize winner Anish Kapoor and this autumn will be showing the first major exhibition of work by pre-Raphaelite painter Ford Madox Brown since 1964.
Councillor Mike Amesbury, Manchester City Council’s executive member for culture and leisure, said: "The gallery attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors to Manchester from all over the world, and displays some of the UK’s most high-profile exhibitions outside of London.
"Staff at the gallery have done some excellent work over the last few years, particularly in attracting families to visit the centre, and this award recognises these achievements.”