Science Museum Near Me in Forest Hill: Horniman Aquarium, Butterflies and Gardens

The Horniman Museum and Gardens at 100 London Road, Forest Hill, London SE23 3PQ, costs nothing to enter and opens daily from 10am to 5.30pm, with no ticket needed for the galleries or the 16 acres of gardens. If you searched science museum near me from Lewisham, Dulwich or Sydenham, this is the one that mixes natural history, a small aquarium and a tropical butterfly house on a hill with a skyline view. One thing to know before you go this autumn: the famous overstuffed walrus is not on display, because its gallery is closed until early 2027.

The Natural History Gallery, home to the walrus and thousands of specimens, is shut for the final stage of the museum's Nature + Love project. In a statement dated 29 September 2026, the Horniman said it will reopen as the Nature Gallery on Friday 5 February 2027, with more than 2,300 objects including the walrus. The Nature Discovery Den is closed on the same timetable, so families who come for the stuffed animals should know the main hall is off limits until then.

What remains is still a full day. The World Gallery holds more than 3,000 objects from around the globe and is free. The Music Gallery displays over 1,300 instruments, which the museum describes as the largest number of musical instruments on display in the UK. Outside, the Animal Walk has goats, sheep, alpacas, rabbits, guinea pigs and chickens, open from 12.30pm to 4pm and free to visit.

The Aquarium in the basement has 15 exhibits and opens 10.30am to 5.30pm, last entry 4.45pm. Adult tickets are £6.50 and child tickets £3.50, with a family of four at £15.20; Gift Aid versions add a voluntary donation of at least ten percent. Children are counted as ages 3 to 16, and under-threes go free. It is a compact room, and most families see every tank in under half an hour, which makes it a good warm-up before the gardens.

The Butterfly House is the bigger spend at £9.90 for an adult and £6.50 for a child, and it keeps shorter hours, 10.30am to 4pm with last entry at 3.30pm. The temporary exhibition Voyage to the Deep: Underwater Adventures costs £9.80 for adults and runs until 1 November 2026. An Art Fund pass covers the Aquarium and the temporary show but not the butterflies, so pass holders should budget only for the Butterfly House.

An honest call: if your time is short this month, put Voyage to the Deep ahead of the Butterfly House only if your children are into submarines and sea creatures. Otherwise the butterflies, flying freely in warm air, are the more memorable room, provided you arrive well before the 3.30pm last entry.

Frederick Horniman, born in 1835, ran the family business, Horniman's Tea, and began collecting objects around 1860. He opened his house to the public as the Surrey House Museum on Christmas Eve 1890, and the gardens followed on 1 June 1895. The current building, designed by Charles Harrison Townsend in Doulting stone, opened on 29 June 1901 and is Grade II* listed. Townsend also drew the 1903 Bandstand and the 1912 extension.

Horniman later became Liberal MP for Penryn and Falmouth and died in 1906. The museum's own history pages are frank about the colonial trade behind the tea fortune, which is worth reading before you tour the World Gallery. Later additions include the Music Gallery in 2002, the Animal Walk in 2013, the Butterfly House in 2017 and the World Gallery in 2018, and in 2022 the Horniman was named Art Fund Museum of the Year.

October half term is busy. Octonauts Storytelling and Craft sessions run on 27 and 28 October at £8.50 per child, including one adult, and a free Octonauts trail lasts until 1 November. The British Wildlife Photography Awards exhibition is free and on until 21 February 2027, and the Horniman Market fills the Bandstand Terrace every Sunday from 10am to 3pm, which brings local shoppers up the hill along with museum visitors.

Saturday 31 October is the date to plan around. The Day of the Dead Family Festival runs 11am to 4pm and is already sold out, the Gardens close fully that day, the Animal Walk is shut, and the Butterfly House is open only to festival ticket holders. Unless you have a ticket, choose another day that week.

Go up to the Bandstand, which the museum calls the best view of the London skyline, then follow the Nature Trail, open 9am to 4pm through October and closing at 3pm from 25 October. The Gardens open at 7.15am, or 8am on Sundays, and from 25 October to 7 February they close at 4.20pm, so in winter the light goes before the museum does. Picnics are welcome on the lawns, though barbecues are not.

The gardens sit on the Green Chain Walk. For a longer walk, Sydenham Hill Wood, an 11-hectare London Wildlife Trust reserve on Crescent Wood Road, SE26 6LS, is open at all times and links to Dulwich Wood and Cox's Walk, remnants of the old Great North Wood. It makes a quieter plan B when half-term crowds fill the museum cafés.

Forest Hill station, on the Windrush line with trains to London Bridge and Victoria, is a five to ten minute uphill walk; leave by the platform 1 exit toward London Road. Bus routes 176, 185, 197, 356 and P4 normally stop outside, but the museum reports both stops are closed because of burst water mains, so use route 122 on Dartmouth Road instead. There is no visitor parking apart from limited Blue Badge spaces.

Food is not allowed inside the museum, flash and tripods are banned, and lockers need a refundable £1 coin. The Horniman Café opens 9am to 5pm and all cafés are cashless, with mains from £13 to £15.50. The museum also shuts if high winds close the garden avenue.