Background

Founded by the pioneering American actor and director Sam Wanamaker, Shakespeare's Globe is a unique international resource dedicated to the exploration of Shakespeare's work and the playhouse for which he wrote, through the connected means of performance and education.
Together, the Globe Theatre Company, Shakespeare's Globe Exhibition and Globe Education seek to further the experience and international understanding of Shakespeare in performance.

Founding of the Shakespeare Globe Trust
In 1949, when Sam Wanamaker came to London for the first time, he looked for the site of the original Globe and was disappointed not to find a more lasting memorial to Shakespeare and his theatre.
In 1970 Sam founded what was to become the Shakespeare Globe Trust, and in 1987 building work began on site when the six-metre deep foundations were laid. In 1993, the construction of the Globe Theatre itself began.
Sadly, Sam Wanamaker died on 18 December 1993. At that time, twelve of the fifteen bays had been erected. The plasterwork and thatching began the following year and were completed in 1997.

The Shakespeare Globe Trust today
Shakespeare’s Globe Trust is dedicated to the experience and international understanding of Shakespeare in performance. Uniquely its work celebrates the fact that the greatest dramatic poet in the English language lived and worked in London and that the cradle of English theatre was on Bankside by the River Thames.

Today the Shakespeare Globe Trust gives expression to its purpose through three central and inter-dependent activities:

  • First, the faithfully reconstructed Globe Theatre, forming the heart of an extensive exhibition about Shakespeare and the theatre of his day.
  • Second, it strives for an international reputation for performance excellence through its productions at the Globe Theatre. New work is also stimulated.
  • Third, the Globe is an international focal point for the study of Shakespeare in performance. The facilities at Bankside are a resource for students, teachers and academics from all over the world and Shakespeare’s Globe provides educational programmes and publish material for students at all levels.

The Globe receives no annual government subsidy.
The activities of Shakespeare’s Globe are self-financing in overall terms. Activities are therefore balanced in such a way that net income from the exhibition, box office and donations is sufficient to cover net deficits, for example on educational and academic work.

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