Museum recommendations

[Lillybobtail]

Please can you recommend your favourite museums to visit with kids? Wanting to visit somewhere new this year.

We have particularly enjoyed the natural history museum in London, national railway museum in York, and vindalanda on Hadrian's wall.

Roman Baths in Bath
Chatham Dockyard

The Natural History Museum in Tring is amazing. One of the best I have ever been to. It’s not massive but I loved it.
Also the Chambers Street Museum in Edinburgh was always my favourite as a child. It’s still pretty good!

Can't believe no-one has mentioned the Pencil museum in Keswick yet!

Natural history museum and Pitt Rivers museum. Both in Oxford.

The Media Museum in Bradford.
The Emergency Services museum in Sheffield.

Museum of science and industry in Manchester is brilliant, can spend the whole day there. We also visit the museums in liverpool quite often as they are fairly local (and free) we often do a loop of Liverpool Museum down by the docks and up to the World Museum and pop in the Walker art gallery which is nearby, they are all half a day ish or a bit less we squeeze in the walker art gallery as the dc love the kids room.

Beamish - County Durham is amazing

Is yorvic the viking centre still open in York?

Museum of London and Dennis Severs House in London

Also centre for life in newcastle and the discovery museum

Thanks so much @NormHonal for the mention, this is my favourite subject!

There's some great suggestions on this post already, but here's some thoughts of the top of my head:

• St Fagans is a favourite of mine, having visited as a child and now taking my own children.
• Similarly Big Pit in South Wales is now a favourite of two generations of the Museum family.
• Mary Rose is such an awe-inspiring survivor, and the story is told really well for families
• Beamish is a great day out, as is Blists Hill Victorian Town, both being recreated living history museums.
• The Postal Museum and Mail Rail is great for kids (I was the lead curator there in a previous role so could be biased, but people keep recommending it to me when they hear I like museums so maybe not!)
• London Transport Museum and their depot (only open 3 weekends a year) are great for transport-keen kids
• Hever Castle is great in the summer, with live jousts, water maze, and giant outdoor castle playground.
• I would include Kew Gardens on this list too as its a historic site - we love the steamy Victorian Palm House, particularly in winter (and its got a great new playground!)
• The Horniman Museum is consistently family friendly, with good temporary exhibitions, a small aquarium, galleries about animals, world cultures and music, a petting zoo and a butterfly house. Plus amazing park view of the city.
• Art galleries often depend on which exhibitions are on. The Olafur Eliasson at Tate Modern is excellent for all ages, really sensory but also clever and thought provoking - but this closes soon.
• Similarly many museums are best visited on their special family days. For example, I recently had a great few hours out at Royal Mews on their Christmas family day with 5year old DD2, there was hilarious Christmas singing, craft, gold carriages and real horses in the stables. I doubt it would have been as good on a normal day. Westminster Abbey family days are free and a really great way to get a sneak peek at the Abbey for nothing.

If you're thinking about a holiday outside the UK I'd highly recommend a trip to Aarhus, particularly for their outstanding Moesgaard Museum, it's the best museum I've visited all year. I've talked a little about it in this post: museummum.com/2019/09/05/denmark-with-kids-billund-aarhus-and-beyond/

If you'd like to follow along, I blog about museums for families over at museummum.com, and on Instagram at www.instagram.com/museummum/. I do monthly whats on and half term activity guides and highlight museums' special family days/exhibitions aimed at families.

I'm keen to see what's on everyone else's lists as would love to do more UK cultural tourism in 2020.

Thank you all, some great ideas, and many I hadn't heard of.

Now planning a couple of days towards Hartlepool and up to Newcastle via Beamish, and a London/Oxford/Portsmouth trip in one of the longer holidays. I think a long weekend in the lakes, and a visit to the pencil museum might be on the cards too!

Yes we would love Kew, and galleries and other attractions also welcome 🙂

My eldest has been to Eureka with school and loved it, so a return would definitely be on the cards.

The Mull if Galloway lighthouse and the Port Logan Fish Pond were also worth a visit if anyone happens to be in that area. The fish pond is small but fascinating.

Thanks so much pombear. I’ve never really considered having a holiday up north before but it looks gorgeous around there (excuse my ignorance, I’ve always considered anything north of Bristol as northern).

For a current recommendation, how about the Tutankhamun exhibition in London? It's popular so you have to book.

If you are going to Oxford the Ashmolean Museum had a fab Egyptian section with mummies and tombs

Eden Camp Near York

Crich Tramway Village near Matlock, Derbyshire. Absolutely fantastic.

My DC (and DH and I) loved Blists Hill Victorian Town. The DC loved wondering around spending Victorian money in Victorian shops (they got it from the Victorian bank). I rather liked the Victorian pub!

A nice immersive experience.