Access

We would like your visit to St George’s Bristol to be as enjoyable and as comfortable as possible. Here you can find information about the building, what you can expect if you’re visiting for the first time, and how our team can assist you. We want to ensure that all visitors are enabled to enjoy our building and events. St George’s is a listed, historic building, which does bring access challenges, and we do our best to address these.

You can click on the links in the black border above as a quick way to find the section of information you need.

If you have questions or ideas, you can contact us using the button below, or by email on hello@stgeorgesbristol.co.uk

If you would like to speak to a member of our team, please call the Box Office during opening hours on 0117 929 4929

Contact Us

Information about travelling to visit St George’s – How to Find Us

View this page’s information as a downloadable PDF

There are two points of access to St George’s – on Great George Street and Charlotte Street. There are 21 steps at the Great George Street entrance. We have step free access from Charlotte Street, where there is a lift to all floors of the building so wheelchair users, visitors with buggies and people with limited mobility can access the Café Bar, glass studio and hall step-free. It is 3m from the roadside to the Charlotte Street gates, then the level access lift entrance is 15m from the Charlotte Street gates.

If you are arriving by taxi and need to state the accessible drop-off point to your driver, please ask them to take you to the Charlotte Street entrance.

If visitors would prefer to access the hall by the staircase rather than the lift, there are 20 steps from the Box Office area to the hall entrance.

Please bear in mind that St George’s is built on a hill, Charlotte Street is at the top of the site and Great George Street at the bottom. This does mean that the gardens are not fully accessible to buggies and wheelchairs.

You can check the view from anywhere in the hall (including from the stage itself) using our 360 degree ‘streetview’ photos. These images are accurate as at 2016 and some adjustments may be made, eg. they include our stage extension which is not used for all performances.

There are limited parking facilities on site and these are prioritised for those with Blue Badges, please contact us for a free permit when you book.

Blue Badge users can also park on the streets surrounding St George’s,  in line with local city council and wider UK parking regulations. This includes parking on a single or double yellow line for up to three hours, unless there’s a ban on loading or unloading. Please always check any signs before you park. You can also park all day in any on-street pay and display parking bay, free of charge, or all day in any on-street limited waiting bay in the city of Bristol. You can also park in any on-street disabled parking bay showing the Blue Badge sign. Some spaces are limited to three hours and this will be shown on the signs. Please check for any updates or changes to these regulations here via Bristol City Council.

For those who don’t have a Blue Badge, parking in the streets around the building is on meters, which are operational 7 days a week. The nearest car parks are located on Trenchard Street, Millennium Square, West End, Brandon Street, College Street and Frog Lane.

Clear Air Zone

From Monday 28 November 2022, many streets around St George’s Bristol will be part of Bristol’s newly introduced Clean Air Zone. Blue Badge holders can apply for exemptions from the Clean Air Zone charges. Please click here to find out more.

We have accessible toilets located on each level of the new building and on the ground floor beside the Box Office.

The hall has a balcony that is accessed by 24 steps, please do bear this in mind when choosing a seat. The total capacity of the hall is 580 seats.  You can talk to a member of the Box Office team if you have questions or concerns when booking. Please click here if you would like to find out more about our Covid-19 response.

Our volunteer stewards are happy to provide assistance. If you require some help, please look for one of our staff or volunteers, who will be wearing a St George’s lanyard.

Drinks can be pre-ordered for before an event and during the interval. Tap water is available inside the hall and at the Café Bar.

There are quieter areas for people who may find crowds overwhelming, our gardens can provide peaceful respite during intervals and you are welcome to sit and enjoy them during our opening hours and events. During performances we have a dedicated quiet respite space available on our ground floor, located in the Recording Room to the left of our Heritage Space (when approached from the Box Office).

The crypt area, with displays about the history of St George’s is also a quiet place to rest and relax.

St George’s is a listed, historic building that does not have air conditioning. We do open windows and doors pre performance but on cooler evenings they will be closed during a performance so the temperature inside the main hall can be quite warm on a summer’s evening and cooler in the winter months.

During most performances the doors will be closed to help protect the sound. If you would like to leave during a performance one of the stewards will assist you, although you may be asked to wait until a suitable gap in the performance. Clapping and cheering the music at the appropriate points is positively encouraged!

St George’s is loved for its beautiful acoustic, orchestral performances and some others are not amplified, some performances will have amplification via speakers.

Please contact our Box Office with any additional questions about specific events, including timings. You can also find the estimated end timings of events in your booking confirmation email.

Some of our performances are relaxed ones, where you are free to move around and enter/exit the performance. Parents are welcome to bring small children, and families should feel welcome to bring older family members living with conditions such as dementia. Relaxed performances have an RP symbol next to the event details.

Assistance dogs are welcome in all parts of the building.

Our Café Bar team will be happy to help provide water and bowls for your dog.

There are several ways you can book a ticket:

You can book here on our website via the What’s On page

You can book in person by visiting our Box Office

You can book over the phone by calling our Box Office on 0117 929 4929 during Box Office opening hours

Free companion tickets are available and can be booked at the same time as your ticket if you are registered on our access scheme. To register, please contact the Box Office or call 0117 929 4929. We don’t ask for evidence when you register, but we do review our access register annually.

Families are welcome at St George’s and there are a number of events where free tickets for 8-25 year olds are available. Look for the symbol on the events page. 

We offer a reduction for disabled visitors, people under 18, students and NHS staff on a selection of our performances. We may ask for proof of status when you come to the venue; or, you if a part of our access register, you can choose to submit this information along with your access requirements. If you would like to discuss this with a member of our team, please contact the Box Office.

At St George’s we want our events to be accessible to as many people as possible, including deaf people and those with a hearing impairment. Whenever appropriate, for example where verbal presentation is central to an event and we know visitors requiring sign language are to be present, we will endeavour to employ a BSL Interpreter to be positioned on stage and/or alongside the presenter.  For more information please contact our box office team on boxoffice@stgeorgesbristol.co.uk.

Our MiniBeats Family Concerts two relaxed performances per day of shows, and will work with a Bristol-based BLS Interpreter who is likely to be known to some of the children and families in the audience. This is both to aid children who would otherwise miss out on the Presenter’s verbal interaction with the audience, and to enable other children to experience a BSL Interpreter at work and to learn about the need for such intervention.

St George’s has an Assisted Listening System called Sennheiser MobileConnect. Using WiFi, visitors can access superior quality live audio from concerts, talks, and exhibitions fed directly to a smart phone, or similar device – either through headphones or via a necklace for hearing aid users. The sound levels can be adjusted on your device to suit your needs and our House Team will be happy to assist you with this.

Headphones and necklaces can be booked via the Box Office in advance or borrowed on the day, for a refundable deposit of £5. You can download the Sennheiser MobileConnect app from Google Play Store or Apple Store to use on your own smart phone or device. This will also work with your own headphones. Please ask our Box Office team at the time of booking, they will be happy to help. The team can also help with setting up your MobileConnect system on your smart phone if you are able to ask for assistance some time ahead of the performance.

We are proud to have achieved the Attitude is Everything Bronze Live Events Access Charter, for 2023-24!