Ulster Museum & Botanic Gardens

The Ulster Museum is located in the Botanic Gardens next to Queens University in Belfast. It is a very popular visitor attraction both with locals and as a tourist day out destination.

Collections at the Ulster Museum include fine art, archaeology, natural sciences, botany, zoology and geology. In the past it has hosted major exhibits on the linen industry in Northern Ireland which was a major NI export. Most visitors to NI are aware of our major points of interest, RMS Titanic & our maritime history, the Linen Industry, the Irish potato famine and the Ulster Museum, the largest museum in Northern Ireland goes a long way to pricking visitors interest.

Originally founded as the Belfast Natural History Society in 1821 exhibiting in 1833, it was originally called the Belfast Municipal Museum and Art Gallery (1929) and in 1962 the Museum Act (Northern Ireland) 1961 saw it renamed to the Ulster Museum.

The museum holds over 12,000 works or art, many exhibiting relating to the social, economic and political history of Ulster, over 495,000 specimens of plants, animals, fossils, minerals and rocks from across Northern Ireland and the huge attraction its Egyptian Mummy.

In museum has undergone a multi-million pound refurbishment and remains one of NI's must see things to do. The museum sits within an other major attraction Stranmillis attraction, the Botanic Gardens.

The gardens are used for community parties and festivals and in addition to the park host the Palm House with its large range of tropical plants and birds of paradise and the park's Tropical Ravine, which contains some of the oldest seed plants around today, as well as banana, cinnamon, bromeliad and orchid plants.

Stuck for things to do in Belfast, then Botanic Gardens offers its part for sun and relaxation, organised park events, the palm house and Tropical Ravine and a little bit of Northern Ireland and its culture in thousands of the Ulster museum's exhibits.

For park opening times and events visit the website of Belfast City Council for museum opening times visit the website for the national museums of Northern Ireland.