British Museum announces new measures against queues at the Bayeux Tapestry: extended hours and an audio guide

The British Museum has announced a series of new measures to ease the long queues at its Bayeux Tapestry exhibition, after visitors complained of waits lasting up to two hours. As the BBC reports, citing the PA Media agency, the museum will extend its opening hours, install clearer signage and additional seating for those waiting, while from Monday it will offer an audio guide with more information about the 11th-century embroidery.

A museum spokesman said the public response to the tapestry had been “extraordinary”, but admitted that some visitors had waited longer than the museum would have wished. The problem was highlighted last week, when hundreds of ticket holders were turned away because of overcrowding, on a day when the museum closed earlier for a private event. The museum apologised to the affected visitors and offered them a full refund and priority rebooking.

The exhibition, described by the museum as “once in a generation”, opened on 10 September and will run until July 2027. The 70-metre tapestry, loaned from Normandy, returned to Britain for the first time in almost a thousand years, while ticket sales marked the biggest day in the museum’s history, with more than £2.4 million in the first 24 hours.

The museum said details of the extended hours will be published soon and that it will also announce a new release of tickets, as the current ones have all sold out.