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Favourite museum?

BeaE

I don't generally like museums much but there are a few that I did really enjoy.

My favourite is the Beamish living museum. I liked seeing all the old fashioned things and visiting the old fashioned shops (sweet shop, chip shop etc). Going on the old fashioned public transport was really fun and quite a lot of the museum was outside, so it wasn't crowded.

I also like the Black Country living museum and the Weald and Downland living museum for similar reasons. I used to love going to the zoo (if that counts as a sort of museum?) but I'm now unsure whether zoos are ethical.

The postal museum was also very cool, as I went through a phase of being fascinated by the postal service. They have an underground train tour you can do, which uses some of the old postal tunnels. It is a bit claustrophobic, but I was able to anticipate this in advance so it wasn't too bad. I probably wouldn't go back, but that's just because I avoid London.

I'm trying to plan a holiday, but don't want to travel too far or go away for very long, and thought a trip to a cool museum might be a good idea.

Do you have a favourite museum? What is it and why do you like it?

  • BeaE said:
    the Black Country living museum

    I used to go there, also York railway museum. There used to be a wonderful one in London, the Museum of Mankind. I find the British Museum very dull - just rows and rows of the same thing. These other museums are laid out so that make sense of lives, not just rows of Roman pottery for example.

    In his book, Religion for Atheists [which I really recommend], writer Alain de Botton put forward the idea of museums and art galleries being laid out in order of ethical concerns - to help people live their lives, for example, relating, grieving, kindness, tenderness. 

  • in reply to Stuart333

    I've not been to a museum for years either, I remember liking the V&A.

    I loved the Archaeological museum in Istanbul, although it's quite overwhelming, when you go to a museum in the UK they might have a few busts and sacophagi, but there; theres rooms and rooms of them, you can't really take it all in, theres thousands of years of history there.

    I was a bit disapointed with The Aya Sofia, I think I'd seen all the interesting bits on tv, it is a lovely building though.

    Istanbul itself is a bit like a living museum, crusader buildings next to Roman stuff and it's all higgledy piggledy.

    I think it's closed now, but the Fairy Museum on Skye was interesting, all the fairy lore of the island all together and celebrated.

  • National Galleries Scotland, Edinburgh.

    "World-class international and Scottish art from 1300 to 1945. Open, free to all. Yours to discover."

    The Gallery design gives a far less oppressive sense in its use of space than many other art galleries.

    Favourite works within the collection:

    1) World renowned painting by John Singer Sargent: Gertrude Vernon, Lady Agnew of Lochnaw (1864 – 1932).

    www.nationalgalleries.org/.../5396

    The artistic treatment / rendering of the sitter's gown fabric is mesmerising.

    Photographs rarely do the painting justice (as you lose the tremendous depth of field).

    2) I also like the use of light in:

    A Lady in Grey (Dated 1859) by Sir Daniel Macnee.

    www.nationalgalleries.org/.../5122

    3) Another thought-provoking piece is:

    Portrait Of A Young Man by Jan Lievens (about 1631).

    "...It has been suggested that Lievens himself, or possibly Rembrandt, modelled for this painting, but it was certainly not intended to be a portrait."

    I always wonder; what was on the sitter's mind - he looks so pensive.

    www.nationalgalleries.org/.../5091

  • When I was a teen growing up in South east London, I used to like Horniman's museum. I remember it as surprisingly good. Founded by a tea trader in 1901.

    I also liked the Ashmolean in Oxford.

    The aerospace museum in San Diego, near the zoo, was good. Not very local though.

    The Forney transportation museum in Denver was a bit eccentric.

    As a kid I loved the science museum and natural history museums in London. The natural history one is probably one of the finest stone buildings in London. It used to be black with soot when I was small, as did the houses of parliament and others, and but they cleaned it 45 years ago and it is beautiful coloured stone. The best description was a cathedral to natural history.

    I haven't been to that many, and none in the last 15 years.