Best Museums in Lisbon
Best Museums in Lisbon.Portugal’s charismatic coastal capital is an open-air art gallery. From the captivating azulejos (hand-painted tiles) to historic buildings, taking walks the storied streets will carry the city’s beyond to existence. For a deeper dive, although, you’ll want to project past the placing facades and visit some of the fine museums in Lisbon.
Many homes housing Lisbon’s top museums are artistic endeavors in themselves. Renovated convents, opulent palaces, and futuristic structure provide unforgettable settings for the city’s first-class cultural establishments.
Whether you’re seeking insight into Portuguese traditions, or need to recognize the works of the kingdom’s finest artists, those are the best museums in Lisbon to go to.
Museu Nacional do Azulejo
Honoring certainly one of Portugal’s most iconic creative and architectural patterns, the huge National Tile Museum is dedicated to azulejos, Portugal’s dazzling, hand-painted ceramic tiles.
For centuries, those glazed tiles were a staple ornament—and storytelling form—of Portugal’s most essential buildings, making the 16th-century Madre de Deus Convent a becoming home to one of the first-class museums in Lisbon.
Inside, you’ll no longer simply see and study azulejos through the a while—from their first 13th-century incarnation hailing from the Arabic phrase azzelij to greater modern-day evolutions—however additionally sight in situ examples.
Highlights of the gathering include the convent’s ornate chapel, complete with gilded ceilings, azulejo panels, and portraits of royalty, and the expansive 18th-century blue and white cityscape of Lisbon.
Museu do Oriente
The Museum of the Orient is one of the excellent museums in Lisbon, and indeed Europe, to analyze extra about Asian art and lifestyle, especially throughout the duration of European colonization.
Over two full-size floors, you’ll admire a curated selection from the 17,000-plus series, the oldest portions dated to 3,000 BC.
On the floor degree, the permanent exhibition makes a speciality of Portuguese presence in Asia, highlighting articles from ex-colonies and buying and selling ports in nations inclusive of India, Macau, Timor-Leste, and Japan. You’ll discover elaborate porcelain works, decorated furnishings, and ivory artifacts adorning display cabinets.
Some of the museum’s greatest pieces are from the Kwok On series, mainly anchored on cultural practices, including Indian narrative mask and Taoist-sculpted puppets.
Temporary exhibitions draw proposal from a rotating selection of themes and personal objects on mortgage to the Museum. Displays may be as numerous as present day-day photojournalists sharing a lens on a selected lifestyle to rather valued private chinaware collections.
Quake—Lisbon Earthquake Centre
For in-depth insights into the devastating earthquake of 1755 which left Lisbon in ruins, head to Quake, a new addition to the Belém neighborhood’s ever-growing museum scene.
Offering an interactive experience, the museum doesn’t just inform you about those harrowing days which completely reshaped Lisbon, and certainly Portugal, but helps take you there.
Through reconstructions of Lisbon’s streets pre-earthquake, seismic simulations, and the danger to “witness” the devastation, the guide-led enjoy is each informative and immersive.
Learnings and seismic research are also provided in language comprehensible for each young adults and adults, presenting a more know-how of Lisbon’s maximum tragic occasion and natural failures in trendy.
Museu do Fado
As you stroll the streets of a number of the best neighborhoods in Lisbon, Alfama and Mouraria, the enthralling melody of Portugal’s fado frequently floats in the air.
Melancholic and haunting, this is Portugal’s maximum famed musical genre, with its roots in social-political discourse and a completely unique nostalgia that longs to be understood. To visit Lisbon’s Fado Museum is to find out about Portugal’s soul.
Providing perception into the how, why, what, and who—particular attention is given to Amália Rodrigues, the ‘Voice of Portugal’—the distance will help you uncover this musical shape.
Multimedia and audio characteristic heavily; many would argue fado is some thing you sense as opposed to recognize. Factual records, meanwhile, paints a photo as to why fado houses and the artwork form have touched the feelings of many city citizens.
Best Museums in Lisbon
Casa-Museu Amália Rodrigues
If the Museu do Fado has piqued your hobby in this hauntingly beautiful style that Portugal is famous for, then your second port of call need to be throughout metropolis at the Amália Rodrigues Foundation.
Rodrigues become referred to as the “Rainha do Fado” (Queen of Fado), and this space, her former home, now celebrates that legendary repute.
Guided excursions help convey her memory to existence through anecdotes and seeing her non-public property. While it’s a small and intimate enjoy, it’s undoubtedly one of the high-quality museums in Lisbon for die-difficult fado enthusiasts.
MAAT (Museum of Art, Architecture, and Technology)
Holding top real property on the Tagus River Bank, MAAT, inaugurated in 2016, is one among Lisbon’s maximum current cultural tasks.
The campus spreads across homes—the previous Central Tejo power station and the present day MATT constructing, a low-slung spaceship-like putting that rises from the embankment.
Inside the purpose-built area, multimedia-wealthy artwork exhibitions spotlight the satisfactory modern works from Portuguese and international artists. The topics are various, masking some thing from social commentary and human rights to structure and layout.
Next door, inside the frequently-skipped electricity station, the evolution of strength takes center stage. With a whole lot of the unique constructing preserved and converted into an interactive museum space, it’s a fascinating perception into the history of coal power and the way cities together with Lisbon have tailored their strength manufacturing over time.
Museu Calouste Gulbenkian
Enveloped through an oasis-like park, the reason-constructed Calouste Gulbenkian Museum has been celebrated as one of the satisfactory museums in Lisbon because its commencing in 1969.
Displaying one of the most vital non-public art and artifact collections in Portugal, a few 6,000 numerous works tell the tale of civilizations from ancient times until more recent eras.
Accumulated by means of artwork enthusiast Calouste Sarkis Gulbenkian, the gathering is as international as his tale. Born in Turkey, Gulbenkian later fled to Cairo before establishing himself in London, and later Paris.
During WWII, he relocated to Lisbon, which caused this captivating array of treasures being displayed in Portugal’s capital.
European masters are represented, yet the portions from further afield are what makes the collection so compelling. Ancient Egyptian statues, decorated Greek vases, Perian carpets, Islamic ceramics, and Armenian manuscripts—that is a true labyrinth of worldwide civilization.
Museu Nacional de Arqueologia
Portugal’s National Archaeology Museum occupies the central phase of the Jerónimos Monastery—one of the maximum beautiful places in Portugal—including an architectural aptitude to the wealth of treasures.
Numerous archaeological finds are displayed, telling the history of the nation. From the Bronze Age to the Phoenicians, Visigoths, and Romans, you’ll find out about Portugal’s past through excavations and discoveries.
While plenty is devoted to archaeological digs in Portugal and the Iberian Peninsula, from ancient jewelry to coins and Roman mosaics, Egyptian antiquities also are well represented. With round 500 items on this part of the gathering, along with mummies, pottery, and prehistoric artifacts, the focus is on high-quality in preference to amount.
Museu de Marinha
Portugal’s seafaring past takes middle level at Lisbon’s Maritime (or Navy) Museum, an ethereal area at the a ways quit of Jerónimos Monastery.
Dedicated to the kingdom’s naval exploits, there may be a particular cognizance on the Age of Discovery, Portugal’s history-defining years of maritime exploration and colonial expansion.
Model and genuine ships, a report claiming seaplane, and stories of those key to the naval missions, which includes Henry the Navigator, all feature within the over 15,000-robust nautical-themed collection. However, there’s little acknowledgment of the u . S . A .’s colonizing impact, nor the founding of the Atlantic slave change.
MAC/CCB (Museum of Contemporary Art / Centro Cultural de Belém)
Since 2006, the exciting and sundry exhibitions of Museu Coleção Berardo have set a gold wellknown for present day and modern art shows in Lisbon.
However, as of January 2023, the distance in Belém’s cultural district has been reborn beneath a brand new call, the MAC/CCB. While an awful lot of the personal collection will remain in situ, it also opens the door to more works from past the non-public collection.
Minimalism, Modernism, and Avant-garde, although, will stay at the forefront of the Museum’s ethos, making sure this stays one of the exceptional museums in Lisbon for admirers of modern-day and Modern artwork.
Lisboa Story Centre
In the heart of the downtown Baixa district, the Lisbon Story Center stands proud from the trio of museums surrounding the grand Praça do Comércio. If you favor to pay attention and see history instead of study approximately it, that is one of the satisfactory museums in Lisbon to go to.
Over one hour, you’ll embark on a multimedia journey through Lisbon’s records. All the good sized moments, consisting of naval commerce and the earthquake, are in brief explored, with visible fashions, scenes, and video accompanying the audio-guide narrative.
Post-visit, head round the corner to Centro Interpretativo da História do Bacalhau for some thing a little more mild-hearted. Inside the as a substitute eclectic and interesting area, you’ll benefit insights into why Portugal’s loved salted codfish has movie star fame at the nation’s menus.
Museu Arqueológico do Carmo (Carmo Convent)
Carmo Convent has become some thing of a memorial to the first-rate earthquake of 1755. While it’s been reconstructed in element, the selection became made to go away the roof arches uncovered to the elements, main the ruins to end up considered one of Lisbon’s most famous points of interest.
While this unique open-air look makes a visit so tempting, you’ll also find a compact archaeological museum at the rear of the constructing.
Featuring sarcophagi, ceramics, and glass-boxed mummies, the curious series is small, eclectic, and interesting, loosely related with the aid of the subject of “salvaged items”.
Museu de Lisboa
The Museum of Lisbon’s setup is specific for a metropolis organization. Rather than being a stand-on my own setting, the museum is fashioned by way of a handful of cultural sights, each adding some other layer to the town’s tale.
Combined, those 5 attractions create one of the first-rate museums in Lisbon, although in case you’re short on time, then the 18th-century Palácio Pimenta, which acts because the “nucleus”, is the maximum enlightening.
Tracing Lisbon’s chronology from prehistory to greater recent times, precise attention is heeded to Portugal’s glory years.
Across the opposite outposts, highlights encompass the Roman Theater Museum, containing archaeological discoveries from the 1st century AD, and Casa dos Bicos, with stays of the Roman wall. The latter also has a area committed to Portugal’s Nobel Prize-winning writer, José Saramago.
Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga
Easily missed due to a not-pretty waterfront area, Portugal’s National Museum of Ancient Art is properly worth looking for for considered one of Portugal’s most important and large cultural services.
Stepping in the seventeenth-century Palácio Alvor, you’ll be greeted via a rich and sundry 40,000-robust series relationship back as far as the middle a while. Canvases and panels from Portuguese and European masters, properly-preserved ceramics, and spiritual sculptures are all represented in the permanent collection.
Oriental artwork from international locations inclusive of China and Japan—delivered lower back from the Age of Discovery’s voyages—also function. Equally thrilling are the transient exhibitions, which regularly delve into the museum’s archives or invite modern-day artists to proportion a curated enjoy.
Museu Nacional dos Coches
At first glance, the National Coach Museum in Belém may additionally seem extraordinarily area of interest. However, this charming collection of horse-drawn carriages is one of the most famous museums in Lisbon for excellent reason.
Founded by using Queen Amélia in 1905, the gathering spans loads of years, with the oldest carriage relationship from the 16th century. The Italian-made carriage of Pope Clement XI is mainly pompous. You’ll need to allow an hour or two to soak up all the splendor.
Be certain to visit the museum’s original corridor throughout the street from the bigger and more cutting-edge facility. The preceding major gallery shows most effective a tiny part of the gathering. Yet, the elegant putting—the Palace of Belém’s former horse driving area become as soon as right here—is a greater befitting backdrop to the royal carriages.
Museu do Dinheiro
Interactive and fascinating, Lisbon’s Museum of Money is home to some of the country’s exceptional treasures—and no longer simply those of the currency kind.
Across the 9 rooms highlighting Banco de Portugal’s everlasting exhibition, you’ll embark on a monetary journey. Gold bars, rare cash, and Portugal’s pre-Euro currency the escudo all function. Yet, what makes this one of the quality museums in Lisbon is the countrywide monument that lies under.
The museum occupies a deconsecrated church and inside the former crypt, you’ll find the best known remains of the town’s medieval walls built via King Dinis.
The compact interpretation middle gives the chance to return head to head with the old stones, observed by using a records lesson on the importance of this 13th-century waterfront-dealing with defense.