The newly refurbished Dimbola Tearoom is reopening on Saturday (11th July), with the museum itself to re-open in early August.
A takeaway only service will be initially offered from a new range of freshly cooked food, locally sourced produce and freshly brewed tea and coffee.
New Tearoom Manager Jenny Kent has overseen a complete redesign; the tearoom now has been redecorated with William Morris wallpapers, and the tea gardens in front of the house now are extended with stunning views of Freshwater Bay and the English Channel beyond.
Everything has been redesigned under current COVID19 government regulations.
The tearoom will be open from 08:00 serving breakfast, snacks, morning coffee, cooked lunches and afternoon teas, every day of the week until 17:00.
This is the first opportunity for visitors to see the extensive restoration of the outside of Dimbola, through a private sponsor and local builders Homewatch, which has taken the house to what it looked like in the heyday of Julia Margaret Cameron.
On Tuesday 4th August the museum itself will reopen, with a new circular one-way route around the house, advance online and telephone booking, visitor signposting, more frequent cleaning and antibacterial hand sanitiser stations. From this date the museum and shop will be open Tuesdays to Sundays 10:00 until 17:00 for the rest of the summer season.
Exhibitions planned for during the lockdown period on the links between Dimbola and South East Asia, and a major Jimi Hendrix summer show, have been postponed until 2021.
Dr Brian Hinton MBE, Chairman, says:
“We are very pleased to announce that The Wight Book exhibition, in which a range of top photographers celebrate the quirkiness, beauty and personalites of the Island will now continue until late September. We thought that this stunning celebration of the Island would be a very positive note on which to reopen”.
“We are delighted to welcome back long standing customers, new visitors, supporters and Friends and just ask you for a little patience before the museum itself is fully ready to reopen, with our staff coming back from furlough. We have to get used to this new way of operating so once we’re open again, please bear with us while we find our feet!”
