Ashby Museum has been saved from closure after £16,000 was raised after an appeal made last year.

Museum director, Ken Hillier, told Ashby de la Zouch Town Council's Annual Town Meeting almost 12 months ago that money had to be found to carry out urgent repairs to the building in North Street.

He predicted then that the museum may have to close within a year if the money could not be found.

Ashby Museum faces closure within a year if five figure bill cannot be met

But, Mr Hillier returned to the same Annual Town Meeting on Monday evening to tell councillors that the money had been raised, and that the museum could remain open.

Mr Hillier said: "Thanks to some very generous offerings, particularly from crowdfunding, we were able to finance the frontage, which cost over £13,000.

"We managed to raise that from a variety of sources.

"And the flat roof cost just over £3,000, and that's been done.

"We didn't come to the Town Council once, so we got £16,000 worth of funding.

"And that'll be it hopefully, for a while."

But Mr Hillier also raised the subject of the Tourist Information Centre in Ashby which has been closed for more than two years now.

It shut when the first lockdown was introduced in March, 2020, and its future has been the subject of consideration by North West Leicestershire District Council which had wanted to keep it closed.

Mr Hillier added: "It's been tragic, personally as well as from the museum's point of view, that the TIC has shut.

"I do hope that you can assert as much influence as you can into getting it re-opened.

"it'd be marvellous if the library, TIC and museum could become a cultural area in Ashby. But that's not up to me.

"We can't open every day however, due to the lack of volunteers, We don't open on a Thursday now."