A huge new reconstruction of a prehistoric building has opened at Stonehenge, giving families and schoolchildren the chance to step inside life from 4,500 years ago.
The Kusuma Neolithic Hall, launched by English Heritage, stands 7m high on Salisbury Plain and is the largest replica of its kind ever created by the charity. Built using historically accurate techniques and materials, the hall has taken more than 100 volunteers nine months to complete.
Based on archaeological discoveries made close to Stonehenge at Durrington Walls, the vast structure recreates a type of building that may once have hosted winter feasts, ceremonies and large community gatherings during the Neolithic period.
Visitors will be able to explore the hall throughout the summer before it becomes a dedicated living-history learning space for school groups from September.
The £1 million project, funded by the Kusuma Trust, has been created using methods and materials that would have been available to prehistoric communities. Volunteers working under experimental archaeologist Luke Winter used flint axes, coppiced timber, thatch and chalk daub to better understand how Neolithic people constructed large buildings thousands of years ago.
Inside the hall, children and families will be able to gather around a central hearth, handle replica tools and discover prehistoric cooking, crafts and everyday life.
Matt Thompson, Conservation, Curatorial and Learning Director for English Heritage, said, “The Kusuma Neolithic Hall is such an exciting project for the charity, and we are hugely grateful to the Kusuma Trust for the generous donation that made it possible.”
He added, “With its burning hearth, Neolithic crafts and cookery, the hall is a model for living history – instantaneously transporting you back 4,500 years.”
The new hall forms part of a wider expansion of learning facilities at Stonehenge. A new environmentally sensitive Learning Centre is also due to open at the end of 2026, featuring a discovery lab, digital production studio and accessible learning spaces designed for children with a range of educational needs.
School trips featuring the Kusuma Neolithic Hall are now available to book for the 2026/27 academic year as part of English Heritage’s new STEM in Heritage programme.
English Heritage welcomes more than 200,000 school visits every year across its sites, including free self-led visits and curriculum-linked workshops.
Families visiting Stonehenge this summer will also have the chance to meet some of the volunteers who helped build the hall and learn more about the techniques used to recreate prehistoric life on Salisbury Plain.
For more information visit English Heritage
