Polytechnic Museum

The Polytechnic Museum in Moscow, one of the oldest museums in the world, was opened on December 12, 1872. The building of the museum, located in the very center of Moscow, was built according to the project of the architect I.A. Monighetti. The Polytechnic Museum was created on the initiative of Russian scientists-educators, members of the Imperial Society of Lovers of Natural History, Anthropology and Ethnography. The museum was conceived as a scientific and educational center of Russia, whose task was to intellectually support the technical culture of society through the dissemination of scientific knowledge. The museum was started by the Polytechnic Exhibition dedicated to the 200th anniversary of the birth of Peter the Great and opened on May 30, 1872.

The history of the museum is rich in interesting events: in its halls and auditoriums in different years, the voices of outstanding scientists and cultural figures of Russia were heard. Today, the Polytechnic Museum is the largest technical museum in Russia, stores more than 160 thousand museum items, about 150 museum collections in various fields of technology and scientific knowledge. The expositions of the museum tell about the history of technology and its creators, explain the principles of operation of various technical devices. The complex of the Polytechnic Museum includes the Central Polytechnic Library (more than 3 million books and printed publications). In the Great Auditorium of the Museum, poetic and musical evenings, meetings with outstanding people, speeches of scientists are held.