Gainsborough's House
Museums & Science Centres · Long Melford, Suffolk
No reviews yet
Closed — opens tomorrow at 10am
🏠 Indoor & outdoor
What’s there
- Café on site
- On-street parking only
- Baby changing
Access & inclusion
- Step-free access
No dedicated visitor car park. 3 disabled badge-holder bays on Gainsborough Street (3-hour limit, Mon-Sat 8am-6pm); public Pay & Display car parks a short walk away (from GBP1); coach drop-off on Gainsborough Street.
Only facilities we’ve confirmed are listed — anything missing here we simply haven’t checked, rather than know to be absent.
Gainsborough's House is the birthplace of the celebrated painter Thomas Gainsborough (1727-88): a Grade I listed historic house in the centre of Sudbury that is now the National Centre for Gainsborough and the largest gallery in Suffolk. Reopened in November 2022 after a major refurbishment, the site pairs the historic house with a bright new gallery wing housing one of the world's largest collections of Gainsborough's oil paintings, works on paper and artefacts.
Families are well catered for: under-18s go free, there are regular family workshops and art activities (including the 'Tom's Tuesday' sessions), a Camera Obscura, and a free walled garden with a 400-year-old mulberry tree - the garden is open to everyone without a ticket. The Watering Place cafe sits in the garden courtyard.
Accessibility is strong: lifts, assisted doors and a wheelchair loan are available, plus baby changing facilities and disabled toilets. Sudbury station is about a 10-minute walk away; there is no dedicated car park, with public Pay & Display car parks a short walk from the house.
Stuff to take with you
The things people wish they’d packed for a day out like this one.
- Refillable water bottleMost places will fill it for free.
- Snacks that survive a rucksackCheaper than the café, and buys you twenty minutes.
- Wet wipes
- Small first aid kitPlasters solve more days out than anything else here.
- Sunglasses
- Rucksack
- Sun cream
- Waterproof jacket
- A penForms, competitions, name badges.
- Portable phone charger
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