One of the region’s most famous exhibits has been backed with new funding to conserve it for decades to come.

The Silver Swan at the Bowes Museum, turning 250 this year, has been given National lottery Heritage Funding for works to get it back moving.

The mechanical avian artefact was first shown in James Cox’s Museum of Mechanical Marvels in London 1773 and performed daily at the Bowes Museum until 2020 when the pandemic stopped its shows.

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For it to perform again conservation and restoration work on some of the Swan’s moving mechanisms is required.

Getting the swan back to full health is expected to cost more than £400,000, with the project given just over £145k from the National Lottery.

A fundraising campaign for the remaining amount needed is set to take place in the run up to Christmas.  

Hannah Fox, The Bowes Museum’s Executive Director said “Thank you to The National Lottery Heritage Fund for supporting this project, we are delighted with the outcome of our grant application.

“The Silver Swan is incredibly important to our communities. We can’t wait to get started and inspire the next generation of artists, makers, designers and inventors.”

Work will take place from September to December with conservators painstakingly dismantling and removing part of the swan’s neck, mechanical drive units and music box before reassembling it all.

The replica bird contains 2,000 moving parts and three clockwork mechanisms in total and has fascinated visitors for decades.

Helen Featherstone from The National Lottery’s Heritage Fund said: “It’s wonderful news that, thanks to National Lottery players, we’re able to support The Bowes Museum with this project to restore the unique Silver Swan.

“It will be incredibly exciting to see this amazing example of automata heritage brought back to life so that local people and visitors from further afield can enjoy its magic for years to come.”

Clockwork specialists from the Cumbria Clock Company, which has previously worked on Big Ben, will supervise the specialism work.

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The public will be invited to get involved with the project with a series of talks, workshops and visits.

Bowes Museum Director of Programmes and Collections, Vicky Sturrs said: “It is fantastic that we have received this funding allowing us to bring the Silver Swan back to life. It's only fitting that as an automaton, we should ensure that it continues to operate otherwise we risk it becoming just another object - albeit a very beautiful one but not the kind it was intended to be.

“We also have to be mindful that as a delicate, fragile and old machine we must ensure that the work is carried out sympathetically and sustainably to allow future generations to enjoy it operating for another 250 years."