Cadw Stargazing, Tintern Abbey, Gwent
Founded during the 12th century, these famous monastic ruins, set in a village next to the river Wye, will be opened up by the Welsh government’s historic environment service and the education group Dark Sky Wales. Astronomers will be on hand to talk about the cosmos and there will be a constellation presentation set up within a pop-up planetarium, while stargazing sessions (split into three groups and suitable for over-12s) will culminate in a communal observation. The ticket price includes refreshments and a meal at the nearby Anchor Inn. Visitors are asked to bring a torch and blanket and wear suitable clothing and footwear.
• £15 (including meal and drink), 15 May, 8pm-11.30pm, 01291 689251, museumsatnight.org.uk
LightNight Liverpool, various venues
Liverpool is a city that instantly lends itself to a cultural trail, and its annual festival of late openings is a hit for all ages. Easily navigable, visitors can start at the docks, where colourful parades have been known to pass the World Museum and weave their way through contemporary and traditional galleries – The Bluecoat and the Walker Art Gallery, to name two excellent options – all the way up to the illuminated main cathedral. More than 50 venues are taking part this year, including digital arts powerhouse FACT and the Camp and Furnace, where guests are surrounded by food and drink stalls. Liverpool International Photography Festival also launches its third edition on the night.
• Most events free, 15 May, from 4pm, 0151 478 4550, lightnightliverpool.co.uk
Politics Pub Quiz, The Font, Manchester
The much-loved People’s History Museum is inviting visitors to unleash their inner political geek (shades of Ed Miliband here) for a quiz enriched by themed cocktails. Taking over this bustling bar by Oxford Road Station, curators plan to detail the longest ballot paper in history, point out who has their own toilet for those quieter moments in the Houses of Parliament and look into the election which had the largest turnout in history. It’s all part of Manchester After Hours, which has dozens of events ranging from painting and performance at the Whitworth Art Gallery to virtuoso guitar playing at the neo-gothic Manchester Museum.
• Free, 14 May, 7pm-9pm, 0161 838 9190, museumsatnight.org.uk. Manchester After Hours listings: creativetourist.com
Moore’s Mysteries – The Element of the Unknown, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield
Experience the splendour of the Sculpture Park at dusk. The current exhibition, Henry Moore: Back to a Land, will be the subject of family-friendly storytelling tours in the Underground Gallery, exploring the great sculptor’s abstract forms on a torch-lit quest to find hidden stories and bring the forms to life. Elsewhere on the night, there’s a Twilight Lake Walk to discover follies, illuminated by candlelight as the sun sets, and a chance to experience the change from day to night in the tranquil Deer Shelter Skyspace designed by James Turrell. An exhibition of work by Roger Hiorns, a 2009 Turner Prize nominee, should also be a must-see.
• Adults/children £4, 16 May, 6pm and 7.30pm, 01924 832631, ysp.co.uk
Family Fun by Torchlight, City Museum, Leeds
At the City Museum, which houses the well known Leeds Tiger exhibit, children can try on costumes and play among brightly lit displays which have been designed to encourage tactile investigation. These sessions are a chance to get close to the collections, with curators and experts leading tours, object handling and a range of talks. Craft activities will focus on collections from Leeds Art Gallery, which has been designated of national importance since 1997 and benefited from Arts Council England’s Special Collections Scheme, allowing organisers to acquire an impressive selection of contemporary works.
• Free, 14 May, 5pm-7pm, 0113 224 3732, museumsatnight.org.uk
The Late Shows: Wunderbar, Newcastle and Gateshead, various venues
Now a glowstick-led annual fixture attracting thousands of people to the area, Newcastle’s Late Shows offer a wonderfully easy way of seeing the city’s wealth of great museums and venues, not least because organisers lay on colourful open-top buses. Those aboard are entertained by tour guides giving their singular take on Tyneside’s hidden treasures. This time, the surprises include a climbing wall behind a supermarket and a closer look at the giant drum that makes up the exterior walls of Gateshead’s Sage. This year’s journey is led by the playful Wunderbar collective and their teen group, Platypus, on a mission to spark curiosity as they go.
• Free, 15-16 May, 7pm-11pm, 0191 277 2168, thelateshows.org.uk
The Late Shows: Sage Speakeasy, The Sage, Gateshead
Gateshead’s musical epicentre is known for enticing an eclectic range of performers: Thea Gilmore, Elvis Costello and Gladys Knight are three of the names taking to the stage later this year, but this is a chance for the public to get in there before them and enjoy a piano karaoke bar. Cocktails will be provided to enhance the cabaret experience, with singers able to choose from an online list in advance or decide their jam on the day. This is part of the excellent Late Shows programme taking place across Newcastle and Gateshead for Museums at Night.
• Free, 16 May, 10pm-1am, 0191 443 4661, sagegateshead.com
1980s Cocktail Night, National Glass Centre, Sunderland
The link between Tom Cruise and the National Glass Centre, standing on the banks of the river Wear close to the site where a bishop introduced glass-making to Britain during the 7th century, might not be immediately clear. But screenings of the 1988 film Cocktail, in which Cruise played a raffish bartender, will be part of the fun for this liquor-laced one-off, including concoction demonstrations from Revolution Bar, guilty-pleasure 80s classics and, conceivably, leg-warmers. Glass-makers will also shape cocktail glasses within the centre’s Hot Glass Studio, followed by a disco for those who’ve sampled enough to feel like dancing. Tickets include a welcome cocktail, burger and chips.
• £20, 16 May, 7pm-11.45pm, 0191 515 5555, shop.nationalglasscentre.com
A Scandal in Surgeons’ Hall, Surgeons’ Hall Museum, Edinburgh
Dark entertainment and a Victorian crime scene at this macabre yet compelling museum. Unsightly highlights include an ankle pounded by a gunshot, a wounded heart, skeletons, skulls and amputated limbs. Fancy dress Victorian or Steampunk clobber is encouraged for their festival night, soundtracked by a cèilidh band and supported by the University of Edinburgh Anatomy Museum. Fortune tellers and magicians will be on hand.
• £10/£8, 16 May, 7.30pm-10pm, 0131 527 1711, onelastfright.wordpress.com
The Great Warwickshire Show and Tell, Market Hall Museum, Warwick
Last year, the Market Hall Museum, in the heart of Warwick, won the Museums at Night festival’s Connect10 competition, and gained the services of artist Alex Hartley. It promptly laid on a very public exhibition in a kind of Great Exhibition of stalls curated by local people to inspirational effect. The trick is being repeated this year, with community groups telling personal stories of why the county is special to them, symbolised through objects interpreted by word-of-mouth on the day. The result is a diverse display with a lively atmosphere and an inclusive sense of fun.
• Free, 15 May, 2.30pm-9pm, 01926 412500, heritage.warwickshire.gov.uk
Night at the Cemetery tour and supper, Arnos Vale Cemetery Trust, Bristol
A Grade II-listed Victorian cemetery full of monuments, the first burial at Arnos Vale took place in 1839, and it was reinvigorated in 2010 following star billing on the BBC’s Restoration series and an award of almost £5m from the Heritage Lottery Fund. In perhaps the most atmospheric of nights out, guides will be leading the way into the mortuary crypt for tales of bygone funereal etiquette and folk custom, following food in an Anglican chapel. A talk based around battlefield surgery is also available for more steely visitors, led by a Crimean surgeon extraordinaire (14 May). Advance booking recommended.
• £8 (tour), £23.40 (with meal), £4 (talk), 15 May, 7.30pm-9pm, 0117 971 9117, arnosvale.org.uk
Viking Voyagers: Maritime Museum at Night, National Maritime Museum Cornwall, Falmouth
Cornwall’s Maritime Museum is currently hosting one of the country’s best Viking exhibitions, featuring a boat-builder’s yard at its centre, a theatre converted into a beach market scene and a full-scale replica of a huge coastal cargo ship from 11th-century Denmark. Featuring 1,000-year-old objects drawn from the British Museum and the national museums of Denmark and Ireland, the display pays homage to ancient Norse craftsmanship. An epic battle and a torchlit tour are part of the adventure. As part of Museums at Night, visitors will be able to create their own Viking armour, handle Viking artefacts and join in an epic battle, before setting off on a torch lit tour.
• £5.95 (advanced booking advised), 15 May, 6.30pm-8.30pm, 01326 214546, museumsatnight.org.uk, further details at culture24.org.uk
Sleepover at the Museum, The Novium, Chichester
Since opening four summers ago, Chichester’s Novium has established itself as one of the country’s most imaginative Roman collections, not least because of its most recent addition: Racton Man, the 4,000-year-old skeleton of a Bronze Age warrior found in Sussex fields in 1989 and put on public display last year. Tours by torchlight, games and snoring are among the activities being promised by curators in this special sleepover for families. An adult-only evening of entertainment will also be held the previous evening, featuring live music from a trio performing songs from the 1940s and 1950s, demonstrations, creative craft workshops, behind-the-scenes insights, a magic lantern show and more.
• Sleepover, £15, 16-17 May, 7pm-8am, 01243 775888, museumsatnight.org.uk; A Night at the Novium, £15, 14 May, 7.30pm-10pm museumsatnight.org.uk
Ghost Tour and Bat Walk, Knebworth House, Gardens and Park, Knebworth
A spectacular Tudor-Gothic estate, Knebworth spent 500 years under ownership by the same family, whose members included Edward Bulwer-Lytton, a Victorian playwright, author and politician with a fascination for the supernatural. His experiences act as a starting point for this tour of the (possibly) haunted house, which was used during the filming of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Midsomer Murders and a string of other films and TV series. Mysterious encounters await guests before refreshments and expert-led tours around the gardens to meet the friendly resident bats. Pre-booking is essential and warm clothing and suitable footwear are recommended.
• £22, 15 May, 6.45pm-10pm, 01438 812661, knebworthhouse.com
Midnight Apothecary, Brunel Museum, London
A champion of convoluted cocktails and exotic food, Midnight Apothecary is a pop-up bar usually based in a secret rooftop garden above the Thames Tunnel in Rotherhithe. When they move, they tend to set up firepits, rows of flowers and re-creations of riverside sunsets, earning them a reputation as one of the best places to drink outside in London. This event includes free entry to the Brunel Museum, where the exhibits tell the story of the building of the Thames Tunnel – a place to marvel at between sampling a Greek grill (manned, apparently, by a handsome pair of men) and toasted marshmallows. Proceeds will go towards a new entrance, staircase and concert hall in Brunel’s underground shaft beneath the garden, and there’s an optional descent into the chamber, lit by flares and hurricane lamps.
• £5, 16 May, 6pm-10pm, 020 7231 3840, midnightapothecary.designmynight.com
European Literature Night 2015: In Spoken Word, British Library, London
The British Library’s burgeoning alter-reputation as a great space for performance is likely to be enhanced by its Museums at Night line-up. In this opener, comedian Ava Vidal hosts five terrific talents, among them Czech folk-rock provocateur Xavier Baumaxa, Cypriot lyricist Christodoulos Makris and Baloji, a Congolese-born Belgian rapper who has been part of Damon Albarn’s African Express during his rise to poetic prominence. Elsewhere, there’s a gathering of six acclaimed writers (13 May), a charged-looking political night with the Ranting Poets (in the conference centre, 15 May) and a night with Saul Williams, Tongue Fu, Norman Jay MBE and more (entrance hall, 15 May).
• £7-£10, 7pm-8.45pm, May 13, 01937 546546, bl.uk
For a full list of the Museums at Night events go museumsatnight.org.uk