Space history lands in Henley at new Space Vault exhibition

A new purpose-built space exhibition and gallery venue is now installed in Henley with an out-of-this-world collection of artefacts from the Apollo programme, Soviet era, Space Shuttle, ISS and SpaceX.  The gallery also features three rotating galleries celebrating space art, private collections and space technology from innovative UK space companies.

The main Space Vault Exhibition formerly hosted at the River & Rowing Museum, the European Space Agency and the Birmingham Science Museum is a private collection of local resident Michael Warner and will be on permanent display.  The three rotating galleries will display new exhibitions every three months.

Michael said, “I’ve had a lifelong interest in space.  I remember staring into space with my father when I was young looking at Cosmos in the night sky and listening to him explaining how to find the Pole Star and remember vividly when I six years old watching the landing of Apollo 11.  I predominately bought the collection from American auction houses which I started about 15 years ago.  The collection of around hundred artefacts is probably one of the largest in the UK.  Six years ago, there was a piece of legislation in the US that allowed the astronauts from the Apollo missions to sell objects that were given to them from NASA and luckily at the same time I had sold a company and invested some of the money to build the collection.”

Five years ago, Michael started to host a series of talks for universities and astronomy societies. He said, “After a few years of this I thought I should either sell the collection or do something with it. So I decided to build it all into an exhibition and take it on tour.  It is rather unusual for collectors to curate their own collections, but it has been great fun and very rewarding.   After the exhibition completed its year long run at the Birmingham ‘Thinktank’ Science Museum, where it was seen by over 200,000 visitors, I’ve decided to bring it back home to Henley for at least a year.”

The collection of artifacts on display features a rare handwritten letter by Charlie Duke reflecting on his time on the lunar surface, and manuals and spacesuit gloves flown in space, as well as components from a Space Shuttle bearing the scars of re-entry, and a section of the nose cone from the first SpaceX Starship to reach the threshold of space.

Until December 2026 the Space Art gallery is displaying a stunning showcase of Reading Astronomical Society’s members astrophotography: from lunar and solar images to the weirdness of deep-space Nebula formations.

Further planned space art exhibitions include David A. Hardy’s paintings from his six-decade career and his time working with Patrick Moore.

The Private Collection gallery is hosting The Mark Yates Collection, including pieces from Gene Cernan’s private collection as The Last Man on the Moon. A highlight of Mark’s exhibition is an astronaut mission training 3D terrain map of the Apollo 17 lunar landing which the mission Commander has marked on the map the exact landing site.

UK Space Sector gallery is showing edge-cutting space debris removal technology engineered by Astroscale one of the UK’s leading space firms.  On display is their satellite docking plate technology, accompanied by an animated story describing how the company is commercialising the means by which service spacecraft dock with satellites to extend their lifespan or de-orbit them to remove the risk of a catastrophic collision.

The gallery runs open days to tour the four galleries and a programme of events that include expert talks, movie nights, livestreamed events and Space Jam sessions all at £10.  Details of these and to book go to: https://thespacevault.org/

The Space Vault Gallery is also available for private hire by companies, community organisations and schools as well as hands-on Behind-the-Vault sessions where you done gloves to handle selected artefacts.