Ad disclosure: We were provided with our tickets free of charge for the purpose of this post.
We were invited along to the Thinktank at Millenium Point in Birmingham, to check out the Museum of the Moon exhibition. We took our friend Detta along as James was at work, and all four of us had a lovely day out together.
There are two exhibitions currently on display at Thinktank, Museum of the Moon by Luke Jerram and Totality by Katie Paterson. Both of the exhibitions are totally spellbinding and are definitely worth a visit.
Museum of the Moon is at Thinktank until 20th August 2017. The art installation uses detailed imagery from NASA of the moon to create a huge 7 metres wide scale replica. It is really quite eerie to witness, illuminated from within and suspended in the air before you. All four of us were totally amazed; it is simply jaw-dropping – I could have sat on one of the benches around the edges of the room for ages and just stared at it!
Totality will be on display until 1st October 2017. The children really enjoyed this one, and I found it utterly fascinating – a large rotating mirror ball reflects thousands of images of solar eclipses around the room. They include the oldest known drawing of one from 1778, early century photos, and images from telescopes. It made me feel slightly off balance, standing in the white room with thousands of eclipses swirling around me… but it’s completely stunning nonetheless.
As well as these two exhibitions, Thinktank has a great summer programme of activities for children to enjoy & get involved with. These include interactive drop-in sessions, art activities, science shows, and so on.
There is also a lot for children to see & do within the museum, with a dedicated Kid City area full of role play activities and a fab water play area. The science garden outside the museum is brilliant too, full of things to do and experiment with. The girls really love this area, and had a great time with all of the interactive inside the museum and out in the garden.
As well as visiting the museum, the girls enjoyed spotting some bears from The Big Sleuth trail. There are two full sized bears outside the building, and two displays of the smaller bears inside. You can also pick up a trail map at the building reception, and it is a great place to start you on your bear hunt.
Admission prices at Thinktank are great value, with adult tickets costing £13.50 and children aged 3-15 years £9.75. Under 3s are free to enter, and they also do family tickets. The two exhibitions & all the activities are included in the entry price, and you can buy tickets for the Planetarium for £1.50 per person – which is currently showing an exhibition of Tim Peake’s amazing photos from space.
I see to go and look at that big moon, we are really hoping to visit before it goes back into space.
I do love the Think Tank.