Blockbuster exhibitions and a post-Olympics surge in tourism have sent British Museum visitor numbers rocketing.
Hit shows, including Ice Age Art and Pompeii, helped the venue set a record for the number of visitors in a single month. More than 660,000 visited in May, compared with about 462,000 in the same period last year.
The museum’s annual review for 2012, launched today, shows it is Britain’s leading attraction for the sixth year running.
In only three months of a six-month run, Life And Death In Pompeii And Herculaneum has already achieved its visitor target of 250,000. It is on course to be one of the most popular charging exhibitions in the history of the Bloomsbury institution.
Ice Age Art closed this month after being seen by more than 90,000, beating its target by 133 per cent. About 105,000 saw Shakespeare: Staging The World, presented in collaboration with the Royal Shakespeare Company.
In total, there were 5,575,000 visitors over the whole year to March, slightly down on the previous year’s 5.8 million.
