A Conservative peer has donated £25m to the British Museum in what is thought to be the biggest gift to the arts for two decades.
The money, from Lord Sainsbury of Preston Candover – a former chairman of the supermarket chain – will go towards a major redevelopment of the London museum’s facilities.
It will help fund a new World Conservation and Exhibitions Centre.
A spokeswoman for the museum described the donation as “incredibly generous”.
She said the gift was a “vital” part of a project which would “benefit future generations”.
“This is an incredibly important project for the British Museum and has been planned for a long time,” she said.
She said donations from other private donors and a government grant were also being used to fund the centre, which will include a state of the art conservation and science centre, with new science laboratories in which exhibits can be researched and restored.
The centre, which will cost over £125m, will also include a gallery to house temporary collections which can compete with other UK and international institutions.
The government has also awarded a £22.5m grant towards the centre.
The gift comes at a time when many cultural organisations are facing a funding squeeze amid financial cutbacks.
The Sunday Times reported Lord Sainsbury’s gift was the biggest to the arts in Britain since philanthropist Sir Paul Getty pledged £50m to the National Gallery and £40m to the British Film Institute in 1985.
In the same year Lord Sainsbury and his brothers The Hon Simon Sainsbury and Sir Timothy Sainsbury financed the construction of the Sainsbury Wing at the National Gallery, which cost a total of about £50m and opened in 1991.
The Sunday Times said Lord Sainsbury’s other donations include £10m for a recent renovation of Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum and money for the Linbury studio theatre at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden.
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