The Royal Mint is to open its doors to the public for the first time in its 1,100-year history. There will be tours, but no gold and silver samples.
A £7.7m museum and visitor centre showcasing the long history of coinage in the UK, designed by Mather & Co, will be built at the site in Llantrisant in South Wales, where the Mint moved in the 1960s to meet the challenge of creating a new coinage when the UK went decimal.
The Mint already has a display from its museum collection – which has examples dating to silver coins struck in London in 880 AD for Alfred the Great – at the Tower of London, where it was based for more than 500 years.
It moved into a purpose-built factory nearby in 1810, and in the second world war a backup Mint was set up at Pinewood Studios, in case the main building took a direct hit in the blitz. A last gold sovereign was struck at Tower Hill in 1975, before production moved to Llantrisant, where it currently makes coins for 60 countries.
When the museum and visitor centre opens next year, the public will also be invited in for the first time for tours of the real high security works. Funding for the venture includes £2.3m from the Welsh government.
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