Top 10 Family-friendly Museums in London
As a parent, you may have difficulty to capture your children’s attention when you take them to museums. So if you’re wondering where to make your children enjoy a little bit of culture while having fun, here are some suggestions:
Horniman museum
Daily 10.30am – 5.30pm
Family Friendly +++ : museum with an aquarium, a collection of around 1,600 musical instruments and a place where people can play; a hands-on base where children can touch museum objects, extensive facilities for families
V&A Museum of childhood
Daily 10.00am – 17.45pm
Family Friendly +++ : finest collections of children’s toys, dolls’ houses, games and costumes; amassing childhood-related objects since 1872; plenty of hands-on activities for kids and special events at weekends and during school holidays
Science Museum
Daily 10.00am – 6.00pm
Family Friendly +++ : seven floors of educational and entertaining exhibits, including the Apollo 10 command module and a flight simulator.
London Transport Museum
Monday to Thursday, Saturday and Sunday 10.00am – 18.00pm, Friday 11.00am – 18.00pm
Family Friendly +++ : first underground electric train; an under-fives play area; the chance to sit in the driver’s cab of a red bus and guide a Northern Line simulator through tunnels and up to platforms
British Museum
Daily 10.00am -17.30pm, Fridays until 20.30pm
Family Friendly +++: For 3–5 year olds:Chasing rainbows with Mama WataandDancing with Shiva
For 6-11 years olds: Reveling round the world, travelling in time, hunting for dragons, sailing on the Nile
Natural History Museum
Monday to Sunday 10.00am – 17.50pm
Family Friendly +++ : collection that contains some 70 million plant, animal, fossil, rock and mineral specimens. The museum’s wildlife garden attracts urban wildlife such as dragonflies, blackbirds and wrens and highlights inner-city wildlife conservation.
Geffrye Museum
Tuesday to Sunday 10.00am – 5.00pm
Family Friendly +++ : recreates a sequence of typical middle-class living rooms from 1600 to the present: an airy restaurant overlooking the delightful gardens; tours of the restored almshouses take place regularly, as do children’s activities and workshops
Dulwich Picture Gallery
Tuesday to Friday 10.00am – 5.00pm, Saturday and Sunday 11.00am – 5.00pm
Family Friendly +++ : beautiful space that shows off Soane’s ingenuity with and interest in lighting effects, bijou gallery – the first to be purpose-built in the UK; Dulwich Picture Gallery’s beautiful surrounding garden and fields offers the opportunity for a day of birthday fun for children.
Old Operating Theatre Museum
Daily 10.30am to 5.00pm
Family Friendly +++ : one of the most unusual museums in London; visitors enter via a vertiginous wooden staircase to view a pre-anaesthetic operating theatre with tiered viewing seats for students
Imperial War Museum
Daily 10.00am-6.00pm
Family Friendly +++ : free First World War Galleries (reopening on 19 July 2014); new atrium; a way of understanding the history of modern war and ‘wartime experience