General information

The New Room is open Monday to Saturday 10am to 4pm all year round. Entry is free although donations are welcome.

We look forward to welcoming you to the New Room; over 25,000 visitors come every year from all over the world! As well as the chapel, there are Preacher’s rooms upstairs which accommodate our museum. There is also our shop which stocks a range of items relating to John & Charles Wesley and the New Room, including our complete range of publications, which are listed in our shop page (you can find the link in the top left corner, under sub menu).

Please note you can also download the latest newsletter from our Media Gallery page.

Step back in time

The New Room in Bristol is the oldest Methodist Chapel in the world (originally built in 1739) and the cradle of the early Methodist movement.

It was built and used by John Wesley and the early Methodists as a meeting and preaching place and the centre for helping and educating the needy members of the community.

The chapel itself is on the ground floor (where there is also a shop) and is accessible from either the Broadmead or Horsefair courtyards. Upstairs, are the Preachers’ Rooms where the MLA accredited museum is located. This contains a unique collection of papers and artifacts and tells the story of John and Charles Wesley and their life and work in Bristol. 

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This is located just a short distance from the New Room and is available to visit by groups by prior appointment only. Please visit our ’Group Visits’ page of this website for further details.

Charles was the younger brother of John and is considered one of the world’s greatest hymn writers as well as being a preacher in his own right. He lived at the house with his wife Sally and their children for several years. The property is set out as it would have been in Charles’ time as a domestic family house.

Please see the website www.methodistheritage.org.uk for details of other historic Methodist places in Britain that you can visit.  The Methodist Heritage Handbook is available from the New Room (cover image below). Please ask for your free copy when you visit.

There is a short service of Holy Communion in the chapel at 1pm throughout the year to which all are welcome. There is also a prayer book in the chapel for visitors to write in during the week.

There is also a regular series of lunchtime concerts during the course of the year; held on Fridays at 1.20pm, immediately after the service. Please check for details of upcoming concerts by visiting the ’Events’ section of this website.  

The New Room has hosted numerous events to mark significant anniversaries, including, most recently, the 300th Anniversary of the birth of Charles Wesley and the 200th Anniversary of the Bill to Abolish the Slave Trade in 2007.

The chapel also hosted the Unchosen Human Trafficking Film Festival in 2008, Celebrating Sanctuary as part of National Refugee Week in 2009, the Bristol Through the Lens photography exhibition by Sheona Beaumont in 2010 and Jane Taylor’s Winter Concerts in both 2010 and 2011. 

Registered Charity No. 1137957