Around Town

11. London Canal Museum
GIGANTIC ICE WAREHOUSE
The London Canal Museum is housed in a former nineteenth-century ice warehouse used by Carlo Gatti for his famous ice cream, and it includes an exhibit on the history of the ice trade and ice cream. This is the most interesting part of the exhibition as the collection looking at the history of the waterways and those who lived and worked on them is rather sparse.
Best exhibit The barges outside; walk along the towpath from the museum to Camden Town.
12-13 New Wharf Rd (off Wharfedale Rd), N1 (020 7405 2127/www.canalmuseum.org.uk) King’s Cross tube/rail. Adm £3, concs £2, children £1.50, under-eights free.

12. Royal Artillery Museum
BIG-CAT FIREARMS
Housed in two buildings at the Royal Artillery’s base abutting the Thames, the museum covers the history of guns and gunpowder from Ancient China to contemporary Iraq. The first floor mixes antique weaponry with informative history, while the ground floor is given over to some serious hardware.
Best exhibit A mortar in the shape of a tiger.
Royal Arsenal, SE18 (020 8855 7755/ www.firepower.org.uk) Woolwich Arsenal rail. Adm £5, children £2.50.
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13. Sherlock Holmes Museum
The last word in factional conceit, 221b’s study is a loving Victorian recreation and a splendid photo op. Bedrooms are fittingly scattered with iconic personal effects, make-believe papers and paraphernalia, and waxwork tableaux from the stories have recently been added upstairs.
Best exhibit Mr Holmes’ armchair by the fireplace – the perfect place to relax with a pipe.
221b Baker St, NW1 (020 7935 8866/ www.sherlock-holmes.co.uk) Baker St tube. Adm £6, under-16s £4.

14. Museum of Domestic Design & Architecture
This outpost of Middlesex University focuses on British domestic design from 1870 to the present, Themed temporary design from 1870 to the present. Themed temporary exhibitions draw out quotidian treasures from its collections. Part of the fun is revelling in nostalgia for a lost way of life, be it butcher boys, 'make 'n' mend' or Soda Streams.
Cat Hill, Barnet, EN4 (020 8411 5244/www.moda.mdx.ac.uk) Cockfosters tube. Adm free.

15. Musuem of London
The history of London, from prehistoric times to the present told through reconstructed interiors and street scenes, alongside displays of original artefacts found during the museum's archaeological digs. The Stuart, Victorian and Twentieth Century galleries are currently closed for a redevelopment project which will transform them by late 2009, opening up 25 per cent more gallery space. The early galleries will remain open throughout.
Museum of London, 150 London Wall, London, EC2Y 5HN (0870 444 3851/www.museumoflondon.org.uk) Mon-Sat 10am-5.50pm, Sun 12noon-5.50pm (last adm 5.30pm) St Pauls/Barbican tube.

16. Churchill Museum
It’s fitting that the man who had 300,000 people file past his coffin before his state funeral now has a museum dedicated to his life. The Churchill Museum is part of the Cabinet War Rooms, preserved to recreate the Cabinet meetings held below ground in WWII. Churchill’s extension explores both his childhood and career while his voice booms out those famous speeches.
Best exhibit Churchill’s half-smoked cigars.
Clive Steps, King Charles St, SW1 (020 7930 6961/ www.churchillmuseum.iwm.org.uk) Westminster tube. Adm £11, concs £8.50, under-16s free (museum ticket is valid for the Cabinet War Rooms). Feature continues

17. Jewish Museum, Camden
This branch of the Jewish Museum (the other is in Finchley) concentrates largely on documenting the experience of Jews in Britain. Exhibits change every three months and there is a commitment to making it a fun place to take the kids.
Best exhibit A huge, ornamental ark which is used to house Torah scrolls.
129-131 Albert St, NW1 (020 7284 1997) Camden Town tube. Adm £3.50, senior citizens £2.50, concs £1.50. Currently closed pending major refurbishment; planned completion early 2009.

18. Kirkaldy Testing Museum
This purpose-built space housing a massive nineteenth-century hydraulic machine, designed to measure the strength of industrial materials, was discovered by chance in 1974 by civil engineer Dr Denis Smith. Realising its historical significance, Smith managed to secure the four-storey building as the HQ of the Greater London Industrial Archaeological Society. Anyone can visit on the first Sunday of each month.
Best exhibit The Machine. Designed in 1866 by Scotsman David Kirkaldy, it was one of only two such devices ever made (the other disappeared in Belgium). The machine could be used to test the strength of everything from bricks and concrete to aluminium and steel. It can be temperamental, but if you’re lucky, you may see it in operation.
99 Southwark St, SE1 (01372 722989) Blackfriars or Southwark tube. Open first Sunday of the month 10am-4pm. Donations appreciated.

19. Geffrye Museum
LOUNGE CULTURE DOWN THE CENTURIES
Lavishly charting the changing face of British domestic interiors, the Geffrye Museum is set out a bit like IKEA might have been in the year 1600. Named after former Lord Mayor Sir Robert Geffrye, it’s possibly the city’s most stylish museum, boasting a fine restaurant and an art installation in the basement. Best exhibit Gardens showing the evolution of horticulture since the seventeenth century.
Kingsland Rd, E2 (020 7739 9893/ www.geffrye-museum.org.uk) Old St tube/rail then 243 bus. Adm free.

Hampstead's Freud Museum

20. Freud Museum
A beautiful Hampstead house and the great psychoanalyst’s home after he fled Austria, the Freud Museum is not only preserved as it was when Sigmund died, but as it was in Austria when he fled in 1938. He had the position of everything in his study written down, so it could be exactly recreated in London.
Best exhibit The original couch.
20 Maresfield Gardens, NW3 (020 7435 2002/ www.freud.org.uk) Finchley Rd tube. Adm £5, concs £3, under-12s free.