Plymouth City Council is considering plans to include a £4m 4,300 sq ft exhibition centre at St Luke's church as part of the £21m North Hill history centre development.
The plans would create the largest single exhibition space in the South West, which would mean that top arts and histories exhibitions hosted in London - like the Natural History Museum’s much loved Dippy-the-dinosaur - could make their way to the city.
The defunct church, currently used for council storage and office space, would be gutted and transformed into a 400 sq m space, with further room in the upstairs mezzanine.
The museum and library buildings will close at the end of August 2016 and handed over to contractors by early 2017. It is due to open as the history centre in late 2019 with an official launch in 2020.