Recommended Natural History Museums to visit in the UK?

[Zachary Armstrong]

Hello DMG members,

Not sure if this is a list-appropriate topic or not, so please excuse my impertinence here. 

I am planning on attending Darren Naish's DinoCon in the UK next month, and having never been to the UK, was wondering if anyone here would be able to provide personal recommendations on best Natural History museums to visit. 

I am planning on visiting London area first and then traveling down to Exeter where DinoCon will actually be going on. I'm planning on being in the UK for about two weeks. Additionally, I am interested in recommendations for the best zoological parks, botanical gardens and aquariums if anyone is feeling generous.

As an aside, when SVP was hosted in Minneapolis near where I live last year, we got a behind-the-scenes tour of the paleontological collections at the local science museum which I really enjoyed. 

I was wondering if it would be inconsiderate to reach out to any museums in advance and ask if they would consider doing a behind-the-scenes tour  for me of their collections? 

I am sure professional academics do this all the time for research purposes, but since I am only an interested layperson, was wondering if that would be less likely to happen. If it wouldn't be considered rude to do so, any advice on how best to approach that type of request?

Kind regards and thanks in advance,

Zach

[Les Hopper]

My suggestions would be for:

• Natural History Museum, London (of course!)
• Oxford University Museum of Natural History
• Jurassic Coast: Dorchester Museum, Charmouth/Lyme Regis (localities not museums, but good free visitor centre at Charmouth), Etches Collection

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[Mike Taylor]

For palaeo stuff, the Natural HIstory Museum in Kensington, London, is unsurprisingly the hot ticket. Its dinosaur gallery is not great, but it has lots of marine reptiles and of course an amazing amount of natural history more generally.

Next best is the beautiful Oxford University Museum of Natural History. It's nowhere near as big at the NHM, but it's just packed with fascinating stuff, both palaeo and other. One huge room, and as you turn any given corner between the cases you never know whether you're going to run into a giant Japanese spider crab, a Triceratops skull, a tuna skeleton, or some godless invertebrate. In my heart, I love it more than the NHM.

Next up, the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology: not as much palaeo as Oxford, but so much good stuff: and it shares with the Oxford museum the uncompromising quality of just wanting to show you cool natural history stuff and not "entertain" you with interactives and whatnot.

These are all rather obvious choices. One left-field one I'd drop in is the Grant Museum of Zoology at UCL in London. Tiny compared with the others, but I've never seen a room so absolutely packed with fascinating things.

Enjoy!

(And I'll see you at DinoCon: I'll be giving a talk about Carnegie Diplodocus.)

-- Mike.

[Zachary Armstrong]

Thank you both so much for your recommendations, much appreciated!

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[Alberta Claw]

For zoological parks, I'd say the London Zoo is worth a visit since you'll be in the area. It's a good-sized zoo with a number of rarely exhibited species (narrow-striped boky Mungotictis decemlineata comes to mind). They've recently renovated their reptile house as well, though I haven't had a chance to visit it yet.

On Fri, Jul 18, 2025 at 6:53 PM Zachary Armstrong <zarmst...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Thomas Richard Holtz]

If you are also interested in archaeology and anthropology, the Oxford University Museum of Natural History is attached to the Pitt Rivers Museum. The latter is an historically important but (in my opinion) very oddly organized museum. It has artifacts from all around the world, typically arranged more thematically (like, perhaps, "masks" or "hammers") than culturally. 

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Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
Email: tho...@umd.edu         Phone: 301-405-4084
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[Ronald ORENSTEIN]

And if you have an interest in botany, Kew Gardens is well worth visiting. 

Ronald Orenstein 1825 Shady Creek Court Mississauga, ON L5L 3W2 Canada ronorenstein.blogspot.com

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