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Social Story for Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens

This story is to help you plan your visit to Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens. 

There are so many things to see and do in Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens. You can visit for free and stay as long as you like within opening times.  

Check current open times

 

Getting to Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens 

You can travel to Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens in lots of ways. Most people travel here by car, train or bus. 

If you travel by car, there are pay and display car parks close by in the city centre. 

You might travel by bus and there are lots of bus stops near us. Sunderland Station is the closest Metro and train station. This is only a four-minute walk away. 

A stone and glass fronted building. In the centre there is a round entrance with 'Museum and Winter Gardens' above the doorway.

Main entrance

Arriving at Reception 

As you walk up to Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, you will see the doors to the reception and shop. These doors will open by themselves as you get closer to them. 

The reception and shop area is light with lots of windows.  

This area can be bright on sunny days. 

There will be a member of staff at the reception desk when you arrive. This person can help if you need anything but you don’t need to stop here if you don’t want to. 

A person behind a reception desk with a computer and other equipment on it, gestures behind while talking. A person on the other side of the desk laughs. The room has a large window which sits behind both of them.

Staff and visitor at the reception desk

Museum Street 

Once you have walked through the reception and shop you will see a corridor – this is called ‘Museum Street’. You can get to all the rooms on the ground floor from Museum Street. 

While you walk along Museum Street, you will see different statues and pictures. 

A corridor with beige tiled floor. On the left-hand side is a wall with historical sculptures hanging on the wall and information points. On the right-hand side is a glass fronted room and entrances into different exhibits.

Museum Street

Time Machine

Time Machine is one of the first rooms you will come to with lots of historical items in it. 

You will notice music and sound effects playing while you are in this room. There are buttons to press that make sounds. There are also things you can touch in here.

You will see stuffed animals on display. These are not alive, and they are just to look at. There is also a diver’s suit to look at.

Some of the exhibits you will see in here are a crocodile skull, some stuffed birds and a stuffed lion.

A colourful display wall with various objects in square and circular frames. In the foreground is a large glass case holding an old diving suit with a brass helmet.

Time Machine Gallery on the Ground Floor

Sunderland Pottery 

This is a big and usually quiet room. In here, you will see lots of pottery made in Sunderland. It is all displayed in glass cabinets. 

There are some buttons to press to hear stories of people who made pottery. 

A bright, spacious room with white column, a blue carpet and tall arched windows. Around the edges of the room are glass cabinets with lots of plates, vases and other ceramics on display. In between the cabinets are wooden benches, and light grey units with information panels on top.

Pottery Gallery

Coal 

This area tells the story of coal mining in the North East. There are different rooms inside this area. There are buttons to press to light up a map. There is also a film to watch, telling the story of a young coal miner.

There can be quite a lot going on in this area. The space is quite dark in some places and bright in others. There is brass band music playing in the background and there are sounds from the film playing that can be heard. 

There is a map in this room. Press the buttons to light up the map 

There is a room looks like a kitchen would have in the 1960s. 

There is also an area set up like a hospital. This has equipment in it that would help miners who were unwell. 

This bird is on display in the room but it is not real.

A museum exhibit on the history of mining in North East England. A colourful textile banner featuring a portrait of an old man with a pipe sits behind a picket fence that has red jackets hanging from it. Gold text on the banner reads ‘National Union of Mineworkers, Durham Area’.

Entrance to the Coal Gallery

Secrets of the Past 

Secrets of the Past has some very old items on display. 

In this room there is a sculpture of an animal’s head. It turns so you can see it from all sides. 

There is also a scull is on display under a glass dome. 

In this room you will be able to hear sounds from displays upstairs in this room.

A white room with tall, white, lit display cases showing different artefacts behind glass. In the middle of the room is a white plinth with a round tabletop and a glass case that shows a model of a large white building. Behind that display is an orange block that has large silver letters fastened to it. The letters spell out ‘Secrets of the Past’.

Secrets of the Past

Getting upstairs to other spaces 

There are some stairs in this room that lead up to the exhibitions on the first floor. If you prefer to use the lift you will find it by returning to Museum Street, turning left into the tall corridor space with the glass ceiling and turning right through the wooden doors. 

Double doors that open with a big, square, silver button. Next to the doors is a wooden rack filled with books. A sign at the top of the doors indicates Toilets for men and women, accessible facilities and a lift. Through the doors is a wayfinding sign in white and dark blue with text on it saying what is on the ground floor, first floor and second floor of the building.

Doorway to the lift and toilets on the ground floor

Winter Gardens 

Walking straight up Museum Street, you will come to the Winter Gardens at the end. You will go into the Winter Gardens through some big glass doors. 

When you go into the Winter Gardens, you will be able to smell the plants that are in there. 

The sounds in here are rainforest sounds or dinosaur sounds played through a speaker.

This room can be bright on a sunny day. It can also feel quite warm.

There is a path that leads around the Winter Gardens. Along this path, there are signs with information about the plants growing here. 

A glass wall in a large corridor with automatic doors. On the glass above the door is text that reads ‘Winter Gardens’. One the doors are colourful pictures of dinosaurs. Beyond the doors is a glass room with a metal twisting staircase.

Doorway to the Winter Gardens

There is a fish pond in the Winter Gardens that has real fish swimming around in it. 

These steps lead up to the treetop walkway.  

This walkway is up a height and open so you can see all the plants down below. It has a metal fence on either side with a banister that you can hold onto. 

A tall silver rectangle that has water running down it like a waterfall. The waterfall has a metal staircase with gridded metal sides twisting around it as it leads to the ground floor of the building.

A water fountain in the middle of a winding staircase in the Winter Gardens

Sunderland’s Glorious Glass 

You will see lots of glass plates, vases and ornaments behind big windows in here. 

You will be able to hear noises from other exhibits in this area.

Large display cabinets filled with decorative glassware that look like old shop front windows. Above the cabinet on the right is pale yellow text that reads ‘Pressed Glass’. The cabinet on the right reads ‘Friggers’. In the middle is a wide corridor with gold letters above it that reads ‘Sunderland’s Glorious Glass’. Inside the corridor is another large display cabinet also filled with decorative glass.

Glorious Glass exhibit

20th Century Sunderland 

This room has lots of different things to see. There are buttons to press where you can watch short videos and hear stories about how people lived in the past. 

You will be able to hear noises of ships playing in the exhibition upstairs in this room.

A colourful exhibit in a museum. Orange pillars stand behind glass domes with items in display. Large blue columns stand behind the pillars and display retro posters and images.

20th Century Sunderland Gallery

Lost Worlds 

In the Lost Worlds gallery, you will see and be able to touch fossils. There are buttons to hear sounds and turn on special UV lights in the exhibits. 

There are background sounds of waves, bubbling liquid and wind playing in the Lost Worlds area.

A large room with different coloured walls that are covered in pictures, fossils, information and other exhibits. In the middle of the room is a frosted glass panel with writing and a yellow diagram on it. Behind that panel is a tall glass display cabinet with fish suspended inside.

Lost Worlds Gallery

Worlds Alive 

All the animals in Worlds Alive are stuffed and not alive. 

There are buttons to press that make some of the exhibits light up or make animal sounds. 

A large glass cabinet along a wall displaying different stuffed animals, including a tiger, a pheasant, an alpaca, a moose head, a peacock and more. In front of the cabinet are three display panels with information on them, telling you about the animals in the case.

Worlds Alive Gallery

Special Exhibitions 

The Special Exhibitions room can change and have different displays. You will enter this room through two doors. There is a square silver button on the wall to the right that will make the doors open for you. 

A large white room with polished wooden floor. In the middle of the room is a large black rectangle block. Along the walls and the walls of the rectangle are photographs on display.

Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition in the Special Exhibitions Gallery

The Art Gallery 

The Art Gallery space is divided up into four sections.  

L.S. Lowry 

The first section in this room has work by an artist called L.S. Lowry. Lowry was famous for painting pictures of people and factories. At the end of this section of the room is a picture that you can touch. It is a copy of one of Lowry’s paintings that has been made to stand out from the page. 

A corridor in an exhibition space with wooden flooring, light pink walls and low wire barriers in front of the walls on each side. Paintings in ornate carved, wooden frames hung along each wall and spotlights run along the ceiling.

L.S Lowry exhibition in the Art Gallery

Victorian Gallery 

The Victorian Gallery has lots of oil paintings hung on the walls and there is a sculpture of a Chinese mountain scene with temples. There are books in on display in this room called Gallery Guides. You can read these books to find out more about the paintings on display. 

Changing Displays 

This area of the art gallery has displays that change throughout the year. It often features pieces from the Museum’s own collection of art or work that we borrow from other galleries. You can check what will be on display in this area on our website before you visit. 

A large room with gream walls lined from bottom to top in old paintings in decorated gold frames. In the foreground is a round, blue velvet sofa.

Victorian Gallery in the Art Gallery

Launched on Wearside 

The Launched on Wearside Gallery has models and paintings of ships built in Sunderland. It tells the story of working life in the local shipyards. 

There are sounds of the seaside being played here. They can get quite loud at times.  

There is a big model of a ship as you walk up the stairs.  

A short film is playing in this room 

A wall that is painted red at the top and panelled with dark wood at the bottom. On the red part of the wall is a display board with a list of job titles. At the top of the board is a painted scroll with dark text that reads ‘Shipyard Trades’. Underneath that is more text in a white strip that reads ‘Classes of workers employed in the Shipbuilding Trades’. Along the wood panelled part of the wall are framed photographs and bits of old machinery.

Launched on Wearside Gallery

Toilets 

There are toilets on all levels of the building. 

There toilets are on the ground floor along Museum Street. 

Places to Rest 

The museum has many places to sit and rest when you choose to. The seats are spread out over all floors. 

Double doors that open with a big, square, silver button. Next to the doors is a wooden rack filled with books. A sign at the top of the doors indicates Toilets for men and women, accessible facilities and a lift. Through the doors is a wayfinding sign in white and dark blue with text on it saying what is on the ground floor, first floor and second floor of the building.

Doorway to the lift and toilets on the ground floor