Manchester Museum, Manchester (must see)

The Manchester Museum is the region’s largest museum dedicated to natural history and archaeology. Housed in a neo-Gothic building on Oxford Road, the building lies within the University of Manchester campus, south east of the city centre. The museum was designed by Alfred Waterhouse, who created the Natural History Museum in London, as well as Manchester’s famous Town Hall. Manchester Museum began life as a collection of artifacts, owned by a group of Mancunian industrialists. They set up the Manchester Natural History society in 1821, moving the collection to its current home in 1890.

The museum currently houses over six million historical and archaeological artifacts, housed in themed collections. The Ancient Egypt collection is one of the largest collections of its kind in the UK. It is currently being combined with the museum’s many archaeological items to create a new Ancient Worlds gallery, opening in 2012. One of Manchester Museum’s most unusual areas is the Vivarium, a rainforest area housing live amphibians, most notably Amazonian tree frogs. Admission is free, and the building is fully accessible to wheelchair users and visitors with sensory impairment.