Alistair Hardaker
Image: string gallery in the Royal Academy of Music Museum (CC BY-SA 3.0. Museumworker)
Royal Academy of Music receives record £30m donation from Aud Jebsen to transform its Grade II-listed Nash-terrace building and reimagine its museum collection.
The Royal Academy of Music’s Museum and Collections are to be reimagined as part of a major transformation of its Grade II-listed Regency building.
The plans follow a £30m donation from philanthropist Aud Jebsen. The museum houses a significant collection of prestigious string instruments, including world-renowned Stradivari, which are played by staff and students.
The gift represents the largest donation in the Academy’s 203-year history and the biggest ever given to a conservatoire outside the United States.
Wright & Wright Architects have been appointed to carry out the three-year project on the Nash-terrace building at 1-5 York Gate on Marylebone Road. The practice has recently completed significant work on the British Museum, the British Academy and the Royal Opera House.
The building will undergo major works including a complete acoustic refit of teaching, rehearsal and practice rooms. The David Josefowitz Recital Hall will receive full internal reconfiguration to create a world-class venue, with refreshed acoustic treatment, interior design and audience facilities. It will be renamed the Aud and Kristian Gerhard Jebsen Recital Hall, in honour of Mrs Jebsen and her late husband. The main building will be named Aud Jebsen House.
The works will add to the Academy’s Susie Sainsbury Theatre and Angela Burgess Recital Hall, which opened in 2018, and complement a new building for large-scale rehearsals and teaching in east London due to open in early 2027.
Aud Jebsen said “I am proud to support this outstanding organisation and to contribute to the life and prospects of its students. I feel so lucky that my late husband Kristian Gerhard’s extraordinary business life enables me to make this gift.”
