Horniman Museum

This museum is an extraordinary place, comprising the original collection of wealthy tea merchant Frederick John Horniman, a pack rat who had the art nouveau building with clock tower and mosaics specially designed to house it in 1901. Today it encompasses everything from a dusty stuffed walrus and voodoo altars from Haiti and Benin to a mock-up of a Fijian reef and a collection of concertinas. It’s wonderful. On the ground and 1st floors is the Natural History Gallery, the core of the Horniman collection, with usual animal skeletons and pickled specimens. On the lower ground floor you’ll find the African Worlds Gallery, the first permanent gallery of African and Afro-Caribbean art and culture in the UK. The Music Gallery next door has instruments from 3500-year-old Egyptian clappers and early English keyboards to Indonesian gamelan and Ghanaian drums, with touch screens so you can hear what they sound like and videos to see them being played in situ. The Centenary Gallery traces the history of the museum’s first 100 years. The aquarium in the basement is small but state of the art. The cafe, with seating in the stunning conservatory, is a delight, as are the surrounding 6.5 hectares of hillside gardens with views of far-flung central London. To get here from Forest Hill station, turn left out of the station along Devonshire Rd and then right along London Rd. The museum is about 500m on the right.