Museu de les Ciències Príncipe Felipe — science museum
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Museu de les Ciències Príncipe Felipe

Museo de las Ciencias Príncipe Felipe

  • 2 min read
  • 39.456° N 0.352° W

Interesting facts

  • Its Foucault pendulum, more than 30 metres long, hangs from the glass roof and takes about 34 hours to complete a full turn at Valencia's latitude.
  • A sculpture of the DNA double helix about 15 metres tall rises through the building, one of its signature exhibits.
  • The museum's motto, "Forbidden not to touch, not to think, not to feel", inverts the usual museum rule against handling exhibits.
  • Construction began around 1994 and cost some 26 billion pesetas, built by a joint venture of the contractors FCC and Necso.
  • Its first director was Manuel Toharia, a well-known Spanish science writer and television presenter.
  • In October 2006 the building hosted the 57th International Astronautical Congress, and in 2004 a Campus Party gathering of about 4,500 participants.

Why it is worth it

The Museu de les Ciències Príncipe Felipe is the long white skeleton that seems to lie beached in the old bed of the Turia in Valencia. Designed by Santiago Calatrava as part of his City of Arts and Sciences, the building is about 220 metres long, 80 wide and 55 high, a sequence of repeated concrete ribs and glass that is often compared to the bones of a whale. It was symbolically inaugurated in March 2000 by Felipe, then Prince of Asturias and now King Felipe VI, and opened to the public in November that year.

The building is as much the exhibit as its contents. Some 20,000 square metres of glass in about 4,000 panes, 58,000 cubic metres of concrete and 14,000 tonnes of steel went into it, and the result is a single enormous hall flooded with light, with long galleries looking out over the pools and the Turia gardens. With around 26,000 square metres of exhibition space, it is counted among the largest science museums in Spain. It was conceived around interactive exhibits and temporary shows rather than precious collections, and its displays range from a Foucault pendulum to a floor devoted to the sequencing of human DNA, known as the Chromosome Forest, and an exhibition on the legacy of Spanish scientists including Santiago Ramón y Cajal and Severo Ochoa.

The museum is one piece of a larger composition. The City of Arts and Sciences occupies the south-eastern end of the Turia riverbed, drained and diverted after the catastrophic flood of 1957 and turned into a long sunken park. Around the museum stand the eye-shaped Hemisfèric, the Palau de les Arts, L'Àgora and Félix Candela's water-lily roofs of the Oceanogràfic aquarium, and the white pylon of the Assut de l'Or bridge, the highest point in Valencia. The complex also appeared as a futuristic setting in the film Tomorrowland (2015).

Getting there

The museum is in the City of Arts and Sciences, about 3 km from the centre of Valencia along the Turia gardens. The Alameda metro station is the nearest, some distance away on foot. Valencia Airport (VLC) is about 12 km away.

Plan your visit

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Nearby places

On these lists

The Most Beautiful Places in the Valencian Community 5The Most Beautiful Places in Spain 150The Most Remarkable Science Museums 17The Most Beautiful Buildings in Spain 18The Most Beautiful Buildings 286

From the encyclopaedia

The Museu de les Ciències Príncipe Felipe is a science museum in Valencia, Spain. It is part of the City of Arts and Sciences, an architectural complex within the city, and can be found at the end of Luis García Berlanga Street. Its director is Manuel Toharia, a Spanish science writer and television personality.

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