About the museum

Where is it? The Museum is in part of the Corner House, in Market Street, opposite the Deli.

Opening hours: Following our winter closure, the Museum will remain closed because of the coronavirus crisis.  This decision will be reviewed in the summer, but the aim must be to protect the health of our volunteers and visitors.  The committee is considering whether it may be possible to offer appointments to individual households.

2019 marked the 70th anniversary of the creation of Charlbury Museum, as one of the functions of the Charlbury Society. In March 1949 Charlbury people loaned items for a Historical Exhibition, opened by Professor V H Galbraith, held over 3 days, visited by 650 people. Some of the loaned items were later donated for the basis of a small museum on the top floor of the Corner House when the Charlbury Society was established in May 1949.  It eventually descended to the ground floor in the early 1960s.  Intensive work by generations of volunteers has extended and improved the museum over 70 years, raising funds from admission fees, selling cakes and coffee, plants and bric a brac, and grants for specific projects from the Town and District Councils.

Following Celia Faulkner’s sudden death in June 2019, the committee are still doing their best to cover her work until a new Curator can be appointed.

Can you help? Yes, why not join the hard-working stewards, who welcome visitors to the museum.  Contact Janet Jeffs, tel 01608 810709.  Unfortunately, it may be some time before the front door of the museum reopens in 2020.

There are five rooms to explore. The restored farm wagon returned to the museum on 13th October 2019, to the room for which funds were raised in 2000/2 from generous donors in the town and elsewhere. On Sunday 13th October 2019 the restored wagon returned to the museum, after years of painstaking work by Michael Jones, Conservator, and his team. The wagon, discovered at Coldron Mill near Spelsbury, used to stand in the museum garden and had become very dilapidated. It was donated by Miss Elsie Corbett and Miss Susan Thomson in 1964. The Wagon Room was built for it in 2000/2, after a massive fund-raising exercise organised by the Charlbury Society (the Museum’s parent body), the Corner House and the Town Council. The delicate exercise of transporting the wagon back to Charlbury was skilfully planned by Michael Jones, and carried out with the generous help of Charlbury Beer Festival volunteers.

To request special visits outside normal opening hours, please contact 01608 810709 (Janet Jeffs), or email the Curator at 

Access: Charlbury is accessible by regular trains from Oxford and Worcester. Buses run from Oxford (Stagecoach S3), and the X9 between Chipping Norton and Witney [no buses on Sundays or bank holidays].

Wheelchair users are welcome. Refreshments are available in local cafes and pubs and there are regular coffee mornings on Fridays and Saturdays at the Corner House. Toilets are available at the Corner House during museum opening hours.

Keep an eye on our noticeboard for  news of special events.

Our permanent exhibition
Charlbury Museum is one of the finest small museums in the county. Its five rooms are crammed with exhibits revealing the history of this ancient market town, together with a large collection of documents, photographs of Charlbury and its people at work and play in years gone by. You can be sure of a warm welcome on your visit, and there are books, DVDs, cards and other items to buy as a souvenir.

Links: To find out about other Oxfordshire Museums contact www.museumsocc.org.uk