Education – SHMH

In addition to collecting, carrying out research and preserving our cultural heritage, one of the most important roles for all museums is to educate.

The different sites of the Historic Museums Hamburg are all particularly focused on giving visitors of all ages an insight into different aspects of history and culture. In addition to providing guided tours through both the permanent and temporary exhibitions, they develop special programmes for the whole family. At the Altonaer Museum, a dedicated exhibition area has been set up for the KINDEROLYMP where interactive exhibitions and hands-on activities about different aspects of cultural history encourage children to get involved.

Visitors to the Museum of Work can see just how well seemingly old-fashioned machinery still works today: in the metal-workshop and the print- workshop there are demonstrations of the historic machinery at work. In Barmbek you can learn the art of printing, just as it was done decades ago, or have a go at making sweets or watch the Menck excavator in action in the museum yard.

Every Monday, the museum workshops are open to individual visitors who wish to gain an insight into the practice or to realise their own small projects. Photo: Susanne Dupont.

In his musical tours, the harpsichordist Michael Fuerst combines the original sounds of the “Fleischer”-harpsichord with explanations of the exhibits and the latest findings in music history.

The Museum for Hamburg History invites you to join in with a whole series of events, where you can find out more about particular chapters of the city’s history. In the “Hamburg after five” series, guided tours through individual areas of the museum are linked with walkabout tours of the relevant parts of the city. And in the “Listen. Music in the Museum” (HÖR MAL. Musik im Museum) format you can listen to instruments from the museum and find out more about the music scene in Hamburg and other centres for music in Northern Germany.

And of course the Port Museum and the Jenisch House also have lots of educational activities you can get involved in: they look into the moving history of the port of Hamburg and the sometimes rather strange behaviour of the former villa culture in Hamburg’s western districts.