Heritage Open Days: Discover the Hartley Hut

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Join us for a rare opportunity to see the Hartley Hut. Located on Liverpool’s iconic waterfront, join our own dock gatemen as he shares stories about the hut and explore finds from recent dockside excavations with the archaeology team.

The three Watchmen Huts were designed by Jesse Hartley as part of the Albert Dock construction. They were built in 1844 as shelters for the workers operating the gates into the river, providing a place to keep warm and dry away from the unforgiving waterfront weather.

National Museums Liverpool cares for one of these huts, known as the Hartley Hut, which is going to be redeveloped as part of the broader Waterfront Transformation Project. The wider project will link storytelling, heritage, community and hospitality on the historic waterfront.

Before the Hartley Hut is redeveloped we are opening up the hut to help share its story and gather feedback to inform our redevelopment. We will be bringing the hut to life with our own costumed dock gatemen and sharing objects of the dockside's past through archaeological finds discovered during recent excavations.