Museum of the Home
A quick, clever walk through 400 years of everyday life. Set in 1714 almshouses, the museum flips between reconstructed ‘Rooms Through Time’ (from a 1630s parlour to a 1990s living room) and contemporary displays about what ‘home’ means today—comfort, cost, culture, and who gets to feel at home. It’s compact, readable, and full of memory triggers; families will find hands-on features and a calm herb garden outside. Budget 60–75 minutes; go early for quieter rooms.
Opening Hours
What's not to miss inside?
Rooms Through Time
Four centuries of interiors in a dozen stepsFireplace to flat-screen: watch fuel, fabrics and furniture mutate while social habits do the same.
📍 Main terrace, ground & first floors
Almshouse Story
Where the museum sits shapes what it showsThe buildings housed retired tradespeople—modest, ordered lives whose rhythms still echo in the plan.
📍 South range, period context panels
Home & Now
Beyond décor—belonging, budgets, and bordersAudio, film and objects map the emotional and financial realities behind an address.
📍 Galleries near the entrance
Gardens & Scent Walk
Smell as a memory machineRosemary, lavender and old fruit varieties reset the senses after tight rooms.
📍 Rear herb garden and borders
Inspire your Friends
- The museum’s terrace is a working set of 1714 almshouses—step count and window rhythm are original, not stage dressing.
- You can spot the ‘fuel switch’ through time: candle → coal → gas → electric, each changing ceiling height, wall colour and grime.
- Several ‘Rooms Through Time’ are periodically refreshed with real donor stories—some sofas and sideboards belonged to Londoners you could pass on the bus.
- The museum was long called the Geffrye Museum; its 2020s reinvention widened the brief from ‘pretty rooms’ to ‘what home costs and means’—a subtle but major pivot.
