The museum at the Bethlem Royal Hospital in Bromley, London, is to be relocated.

The £3m project involves moving the museum and archives to Wakefield House North, a building on the same site as the historic psychiatric hospital.

The relocation is due to the fact that the existing building is “steadily deteriorating”, the archive capacity has been exhausted and the museum’s visitor numbers have jumped from under 1,000 onsite visitors in 2003-04 to 2,184 in 2007-08 and from 5,000 offsite visitors to 85,072 in the same time period.

A new first floor for Wakefield House North has been granted planning consent to provide the required space for the museum service with a central display area, further display rooms and space for items presently stored off-site.

The project has already raised £1m, and is currently fundraising to procure the remainder this year.

Building work is expected to begin in August 2011 and the museum is expected to open in January 2013, with a formal opening in October that year.

The Bethlem Royal Hospital Archives and Museum is operated by the Bethlem Art and History Collections Trust.