Review | ‘£1 a minute’: is the British Museum's Bayeux Tapestry exhibition worth it?

35 seconds a scene is the number in this review I can't shake. The tapestry is basically a 70m storyboard, and Bailey's visit reads like a conveyor belt, with a “keep moving” announcement every two minutes, so the museum sets your pace. He still calls it memorable and I believe him. I'd just pay the same £33 to stand at Hastings for as long as I liked.

Genuine question: is that pace an opening-day thing, or is it the design?

“Time flies, and after 35 minutes we had reached the end. With a standard ticket costing £33, that works out at almost £1 a minute. And with 58 scenes, it was 35 seconds for each. But the experience was memorable.”

TReview | ‘£1 a minute’: is the British Museum's Bayeux Tapestry exhibition worth it?theartnewspaper.com

Read up on the history first, says Bailey, which is the speech I give every class before a museum trip, and nobody listens. His point is that Edward, William and Harold are hard to keep straight in your few precious minutes in front of it. For most visitors he suggests the art instead, the borders full of birds and beasts, which is where a ten-year-old looks first anyway.

“The story of Edward the Confessor’s death, William the Conqueror’s return to England and the defeat of Harold is complex and difficult to grasp within one’s precious minutes in the exhibition. But nearing the end, the ferocity of the 1066 Battle of Hastings is all too powerful. With limited time in front of the tapestry, having read up on the history beforehand enhances the experience.”

TReview | ‘£1 a minute’: is the British Museum's Bayeux Tapestry exhibition worth it?theartnewspaper.com