Our Collection

The collection of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust is among the most important Shakespeare collections in the world, with the aim to share William Shakespeare, his life, works and times. The joint Shakespearian collections of the SBT together with the Royal Shakespeare Company have been awarded designated status as a Collection of National Importance by the Arts Council England. The collections relate not only to Shakespeare and his works, but also to literary context, local history and the continuing evolution of theatre and performance.

Discover Shakespeare, our online collections catalogue, was launched in 2016 to provide online access to records from all our collections departments; museum, library, archive and RSC performances. As our collection is constantly growing, we are continually updating the catalogue to ensure we can provide the most accurate information possible with more records and images being uploaded each month. While we continue to develop our database, we have a number of subject specific databases available here to assist you with your search.

We have approximately 1,000,000 items across all of our collections, so if you are unable to find what you are looking for on Discover Shakespeare, do get in touch via the 'Contact us' page below.