Winchester City Museum

Winchester City Museum curates the vast history of the city, once the capital of the UK. From Roman mosaics to Saxon and Victorian history, you’ll find out the key and varied events in Winchester’s history.

Great to add in to a morning or afternoon pottering around the city, take a look…

Location

📍 The Square, Winchester, SO23 9ES

This museum is central by The Square, a popular food and shopping area. It’s about half way down and just off the main high street. It’s also right on one of the entrances to Winchester Cathedral’s grounds too.

You can’t miss the tall stone building, it really stands out and is adorned with pennants and signage identifying it.

Some of the stone artefacts at Winchester City Museum

Inside the Museum

Artefacts at the Winchester City Museum are spaced over several floors. I’d recommend starting at the top to make your way down through each of the floors.

The three galleries start from the Iron Age and come right up to the modern day. It also covers the last journey of Jane Austen to the hunt for King Alfred’s remains.

There’s a mix of interactive displays, video and fixed graphics to read, as well as a few costumes to try on too. Don’t forget to capture a classic museum selfie. I mean, did you even visit the museum if you didn’t get THAT photo in fancy dress?

My favourite part of the museum is the large floor mosaic, the story behind it and how beautifully it has been preserved. The viewing platform allows a great view and the accompanying information explains how it was discovered, the damage and how it was moved.

Days out in Winchester

While there’s quite a lot packed into the Winchester City Museum building it’s not an all day sort of place. But it will happily fill an hour or two, so it is perfect for a day pottering about the city.

You could easily combine it with some of the other shorter cultural experiences in the city for a fuller day out.

Within walking distance there is…

Westgate Museum
Winchester City Mill
Six museums at the peninsula barracks, also known as Winchester’s Military Quarter
Exhibitions at the Winchester Discovery Centre/Winchester Library
St. Giles Hill Viewpoint

I think keeping the ground floor until last is best, because there’s a model that can be viewed from 360 degrees. It shows the city in 1870 before some of the city’s larger landmarks were built. The model is huge and it’s interesting to see how Winchester has developed, it feels like a good finale.

Visit the Winchester City Museum

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