Review: Harvard Museum of Natural History

Give us a top line view?
This museum proves fascinating for adults and science-minded kids alike. Since 1998, its more than 150-year-old red brick building has served as the public-facing side of Harvard’s botanical, geological, and zoology research. Some of the collections here began as early as the 1780s. Admission here also grants access to the adjacent Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology.

What will we find in the permanent collection?
Expect permanent exhibitions ranging from mounted wildlife to ancient meteorites, dinosaur fossils to storm simulations—all displayed in 12 galleries that show off some 12,000 specimens. Among the most famous and surprising holdings is the collection of 4,300 glass flowers commissioned by a Harvard professor to help teach botany. A father-and-son team of Czech artists made them between 1887 and 1936.

And what about seasonal exhibitions?
The museum usually has several temporary, rotating exhibits. These cover the breadth of the museum’s subject matter and are all initiated and organized by the institution’s curators, often with the help of Harvard faculty or special guests. Recent shows include ones dedicated to climate change, sharks, and plants collected by Henry David Thoreau. Planned forthcoming programming includes exhibits on ants and termites and sea monsters.

On the practical tip, how were the facilities?
Although the exhibition spaces are on the third floor of the building, the museum is easily accessible. Visitors should avoid the front entrance at 26 Oxford Street, however, and instead use the North Entrance located on the building’s left side.

What will we find in the gift shop?
You’ll find many of the expected natural history museum buys here—geodes and t-shirts emblazoned with dinosaurs and animals, books on science for kids and adults as well as lab kits for school-age children. But there’s also an array of items from artisans, local and otherwise, that take inspiration, direct or more glancing, from the museum’s holdings: pieces that use the glass flower collection as a jumping off point, say, or jewelry that has a particularly geological bent.

What if we get hungry?
There’s no café in the museum, but the sit-down restaurants and fast-casual joints of Harvard Square are a ten-minute walk away across the Yard.

What if we're short on time? Should we still come?
Yes, i's totally, doable. Highlights to hit would be the glass flowers (probably the most interesting thing in the museum’s collection), the dinosaur hall (don’t miss the world’s only mounted Kronosaurus and one of the first Triceratops skulls ever discovered), the gem gallery (check out the 1,600-pound Brazilian amethyst geode), and the great mammal hall (look up to see the five whale skeletons suspended from the ceiling). Then dash over to the museum’s partner institution, the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology if you've got a some minutes to spare.