City Museum

Stephanie Eng posted this last semester. It's worth posting again!

While visiting St. Louis, MO last weekend I was slightly disappointed when I found out that I would be spending my afternoon in a museum, The City Museum. Don't get me wrong, I do have an appreciation for the arts and can appreciate the vast collection of knowledge found at the typical museum. I, however, am not a huge fan of reading plaque after plaque attempting to soak in and appreciate every exhibit. Quite frankly, I am typically mentally exhausted after a few hours in a massive museum. I was more than pleasantly surprised to find out that this is not "the typical museum," according to my kind hostess. It's about experiencing the museum by using your every sense. The museum is housed in a 600,000 square-foot warehouse and every part of the museum has been recycled from the city of St. Louis. Like any innovative experience, no words can do this museum justice. Bob Cassilly, the man who came up with the idea of this unique museum says, "CITY MUSEUM makes you want to know. The point is not to learn every fact, but to say, 'Wow, that's wonderful.' And if it's wonderful, it's worth preserving." In short, however, the museum is like a giant playground that even adults can crawl through. As soon as you enter you start exploring and crawling through whatever small passageway you can find that can range from crawling through a giant whale (mouth to butt - yep!), tubes of metal, hollowed logs, and a fake cave (these are only a few examples). One of the museum's highlights is the seven story spiral slide, a personal favorite. After crawling around inside of the museum it's time to try exploring the old airplanes suspended in the air outside the building. Like I said, it's tough to explain so check out this photo tour on their website ... http://www.citymuseum.org/phototour.html Experiencing the innovative The City Museum was truly unique and incredible. Even though I may not have left with facts and figure about St. Louis, my heart was captivated through this a-typical learning experience.