-
National Air & Space Museum
Each year, eight million people visit these cavernous halls filled with alighted airplanes and soaring spacecraft (including the Wright Brothers' Flyer , Charles Lindbergh's Spirit of St Louis and the Apollo 11 command module). The museum's 23 galleries trace the history of aviation and space exploration through interactive displays and historic artefacts.
-
National Air Force Memorial
Overlooking the Pentagon and adjacent to Arlington National Cemetery, this new memorial opened in time to celebrate the 60th birthday of the United States Air Force. It pays tribute to the millions of men and women who served in the air force and its predecessor organizations.
-
National Archives
Inside this grand neoclassical building (enter from Constitution Ave NW) is a dimly lit rotunda with the three original documents upon which the US government is based: the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill of Rights. Don't expect to linger over the Big Three - guards make you keep moving - but you can study the Magna Carta of 1297 (courtesy of erstwhile presidential candidate H Ross Perot) and other documents at your leisure.
-
National Building Museum
Devoted to the architectural arts, this underappreciated museum is appropriately housed in an architectural jewel: the 1887 Old Pension Building. Four stories of ornamented balconies flank the dramatic 316ft-wide atrium. The Corinthian columns, 75ft high, are among the largest in the world. The space has hosted 16 inaugural balls from Grover Cleveland's in 1885 to George W's in 2005.
-
National Bureau Of Engraving & Printing
If money does not grow on trees, where does it come from? You can see for yourself at the National Bureau of Engraving & Printing, where all US paper currency is designed, engraved and printed. Forty-minute guided tours demonstrate how around US$700 million a day is churned out, and show exhibits on counterfeiting and unusual bills. All that green is a big thrill with the kids. Arrive early, as only a limited number of tickets are distributed.
-
National Gallery of Art
This author has fond memories of getting lost amid the National Gallery of Art's exotic treasures as a kid. She'll never forget the way it felt to stand tiny next to Alexander Calder's massive child-like mobile. Made from cutouts of the brightest primary colors and set in a four-story atrium, it generally knocks the breath out of everyone who sees it.
-
National Geographic Explorers Hall
This natural science museum at National Geographic Society headquarters can't compete with the Smithsonian's more extensive offerings downtown, but it's worth a stop if you have kids in tow. They'll enjoy its rotating, hands-on exhibits on exploration, adventure and earth sciences. Recent exhibits have included Shackleton's Antarctic-expedition photography and natural history drawings from National Geographic magazine's early years.
-
National Japanese American Memorial
Patriotism of Japanese immigrants to the US during WWII is remembered at this triangular plaza with inscriptions commemorating such sentiment. The centerpiece of the grounds is a statue depicting two cranes bound with barbed wire. It is meant to symbolize the battle to overcome prejudice against Japanese-Americans in the decades following the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941.
-
National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial
The memorial on Judiciary Sq commemorates the 14,500 US police officers killed on duty since 1794. In the style of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, names of the dead are carved on two marble walls curving around a plaza; new names are added during a moving candlelight vigil each year in May. Peeking over the walls, bronze lion statues protect their sleeping cubs (presumably as law enforcement officers protect us).
-
National Museum Of African Art
Devoted to ancient and modern sub-Saharan African art, the peaceful galleries display masks, textiles, ceramics, ritual objects and other examples of the visual traditions of a continent of 900 distinct cultures, and comprise the country's foremost collection of traditional work. Don't miss the eight Hot Spots highlighted at the information desk. We like the small collection of highly accomplished creations from the Kingdom of Benin.
-
Advertisement
-
National Museum Of American Art & National Portrait Gallery
These inseparable Smithsonian museums are looking brilliant these days, thanks to a multi-million-dollar facelift. They share the 19th-century US Patent Office building, a neoclassical quadrangle that hosted Lincoln's second inaugural ball and a Civil War hospital. Walt Whitman based The Wound-Dresser upon his experiences as a volunteer nurse here ('The hurt and wounded I pacify with soothing hand/I sit by the restless all the dark night…').
Read more about National Museum Of American Art & National Portrait Gallery
-
National Museum Of American History
This museum houses the greatest collection of Americana on earth. Dizzy Gillespie's trumpet, Kermit the Frog, Alexander Graham Bell's phone, Tommy guns - all the stuff that has made this nation what it is, you'll find right here. There is also the original Star-Spangled Banner housed in a special viewing area.
-
National Museum Of Health & Medicine
Forensics junkies love this 'Library of Congress of the dead,' as described by science writer Gina Kolata, which contains both straightforward scientific exhibits and freakish medical oddities. You'll find cannonball-shredded leg bones removed from Civil War soldiers, the bullet that killed Lincoln and fragments of his shattered skull, President Garfield's spinal column, and many other preserved body parts on display.
-
National Museum Of Natural History
Welcoming more than nine million guests each year, this is one of the world's most visited museums - and it just keeps getting better with two new exhibits added in the last five years. The excellent Hall of Mammals demonstrates how mammals have evolved by adapting to changing environments, while the sometimes raw and bitter-tasting African Voices captures the dynamism, diversity and influence of Africa's people scattered across the globe.
-
National Museum Of The American Indian
One of the newer Smithsonian museums this place tells the story of the American Indian in a format not often employed by mainstream museums, with mixed results. The idea, to use native communities' authentic voices and own interpretations of events to debunk stereotypes, is imaginative but unfortunately comes across as a little dry and too texty to hold the casual sightseer's attention for very long.
-
National Museum Of Women In The Arts
The only American museum devoted exclusively to women's artwork resides in this magnificent Renaissance-revival mansion. Its colletion of 2600 works by almost 700 female artists from 28 countries moves from Renaissance artists like Lavinia Fontana to 20th-century works by Kahlo, O'Keeffe and Frankenthaler. The permanent collection is largely paintings (mostly portraits at that), but the special collections and rotating exhibits are exceptional.
-
National Postal Museum
The newest Smithsonian museum, in the National Capitol Post Office Building, features kid-friendly exhibits on postal history from the Pony Express to modern times. There are antique mail planes, beautiful old stamps, Cliff Clavin's uniform (from the sitcom Cheers) and great exhibits of old letters (from soldiers, pioneers and others).
Philatelists should head to the shop for current US stamps and poster-size blow-ups of unique historical stamps.
-
National Public Radio
One of America's favorite radio news outlets, old-fashioned NPR (not too long ago they were producing newscasts by splicing reels of audio with a razor blade and tape instead of using the modern, less injury-prone, digital method) offers tours of its head offices. Visitors see the satellite control center, desks for national, foreign, science and arts news and the studios where shows like Morning Edition and All Things Considered are recorded.
-
National Sculpture Garden
This is Washington's Central Park, sure to bring out the romantic in even the most cynical of lovers. The National Gallery of Art's delightful 6-acre garden is studded with whimsical sculptures like Roy Lichtenstein's House , a giant Claes Oldenburg typewriter eraser and Louise Bourgeois' leggy Spider . They are scattered around a fountain - a most welcome place to dip your feet in summer. Nov-Mar, the central fountain becomes the quaint Ice Rink.
-
National World War II Memorial
DC's newest memorial is particularly moving at dusk, when the American flags are lowered and the mixture of white lights illuminating marble pillars and fountains, reflecting in inky pools, creates a picture as haunting as it is beautiful.
-
Advertisement
-
National Zoological Park
The latest effort in the National Zoo's modernization plan, the Asia Trail, opened in September 2006. The centerpiece of the area is the renovated Fuji-film-sponsored Giant Panda Habitat, which nearly doubles the outdoor playground for pandas Mei Xiang, Tian Tian and cute cub Tai Shan and attempts to mimic their natural habitat.
The zoo has several shops selling toys and products featuring all manner of charismatic fauna, as well as a book store.
-
Navy Memorial & Naval Heritage Center
The circular plaza is bordered by masts sporting semaphore flags; on its western side a sculpted seaman - the Lone Sailor - hunches down in his peacoat as a tribute to sea service. The Naval Heritage Center is on the same grounds and displays artifacts and ship models, and has a meditation room and a Navy Memorial Log. At daily, its theater screens the gung-ho At Sea , which dramatically depicts battle-group maneuvers.
-
Oak Hill Cemetery
This 24-acre, obelisk-studded cemetery contains winding walks and 19th-century gravestones set into the hillsides of Rock Creek. James Renwick designed the lovely gatehouse and the wee gneiss chapel, both c 1850.
-
Octagon Museum
Designed by William Thornton (the Capitol's first architect) in 1800, this is a symmetrically winged Federal structure designed to fit an odd triangular lot. Knowledgeable docents show you the Octagon's hidden doorways, twin staircases and period furniture. Upstairs galleries host exhibits on architecture and design; downstairs exhibits explain the careful archaeological work required to restore this and other old houses.
-
Odyssey Cruises
Odyssey has the only ship designed to fit underneath all of the Potomac's historic bridges; it cruises up past Arlington Cemetery, the Lincoln Memorial, the Kennedy Center and Georgetown.
