Bishop Bonner’s Cottage Museum

Museum now open Friday 3rd May – Saturday 28th September 2024!

Bishop Bonner’s Cottage Museum on the right, in the centre the bell-tower, and to the left St Nicholas’ Church.

Bishop Bonner’s Cottages:
Dereham’s Local History Museum

Bishop Bonner’s Cottages, a beautiful timber-framed, thatched building, is the oldest surviving domestic building in Dereham. It has its original sloping ceilings, tiny rooms, twisting staircases and wooden beams, and along the front is a fine example of pargeting, the decorative plaster sometimes seen on old buildings in Suffolk and Norfolk.

The row of three cottages survived the great fire of 1679 as well as the Zeppelin Raid of 1915. The Zeppelin passed almost overhead, dropping bombs in Church Street to the East and near Church Farm to the West but missed the cottages and the Church. Today the cottages are owned and maintained by the Town Council and leased to Dereham Heritage Trust for a Museum. If you would like to read more about the history of the building, take a look at Derehamhistory.co.uk, as well as an article published in our Autumn 2021 Newsletter.

New for 2024

Life in Victorian Dereham

New for 2024, ‘Life in Victorian Dereham’ offers a snapshot of everyday life in the market town in the mid-to-late Victorian era.
Where would you buy your hats? How would you advertise for a domestic servant? Where would you send your children to school? How would you find a cure for your ailments?
Learn more about local Dereham characters, their businesses and trades, as well as the changes that have taken place in society and the town.

John Craske: Picturing Peace

Exclusive to 2024, the exhibition ‘John Craske: Picturing Peace’ is the culmination of Dereham Heritage Trust’s community art and wellbeing initiative of the same name.
On display in the museum are more than 90 Pictures of Peace – all created by the local community – inspired by the story of Dereham’s famous fisherman-turned-artist. You can read about the project HERE.

Museum Displays

  • Dereham: An Ancient Market Town
  • Life in the Cottages
  • The Victorian Toy Shop
  • A History of the Cottage Building

Visit Us

This year, the museum will be open on Fridays and Saturdays, from 3rd May to 28th September. Opening times are as followed:
Friday 10 am – 1 pm
Saturday 10 am – 4 pm

Click the map for directions.


Bishop Bonner’s Cottage Museum is in St Withburga Lane, NR19 1ED, close to the Parish Church of St Nicholas, and to St Withburga’s Well.

Admission is £3, or free to members of Dereham Heritage Trust. Entry is free for under-16s, who must be accompanied by an adult.

We also offer group visits. For more information, please visit our Group Bookings webpage.

Disabled access
The nature of this old building, with its winding, narrow and steep staircases and uneven floors, makes access to the first floor difficult. Unfortunately, because of narrow passages, there is wheelchair access to one or two of the ground-floor rooms only, but we will be pleased to admit wheelchair users to those free of charge. We are currently planning to develop a digital presentation of the whole Museum so those who cannot access the other rooms can take a virtual look around the displays.