Natural History Museum to reopen hidden gallery closed since Second World War

The Natural History Museum (NHM) will reopen a hidden gallery that has been closed since the Second World War.

For the first time in more than eight decades, the Nature and Us gallery at the London museum will reopen this September after being closed to the public since 1943.

The reopening is part of NHM150, a transformation project that will see the museum open a new or revitalised gallery each year leading up to its 150th anniversary in 2031.

The gallery will initially reopen for 18 months on September 16 with Nature and Us, supported by the Natural Environment Research Council, where visitors can explore our evolving relationship with the natural world through 50 remarkable objects.

A miniature model of a Crystal Palace dinosaur is among the key specimens and historic objects that will feature in the gallery to illustrate how early scientists and artists imagined prehistoric life.

The gallery will also include a Victorian skeleton of a monk seal named Jenny to show how wild animals were once exploited for entertainment.

Other items include a bryozoan-encrusted Star Wars toy from the 1980s, showing how everyday objects can acquire new meanings through nature and time, and a 400,000-year-old hand axe whose discovery transformed our understanding of when humans first existed.

Visitors will also be able to touch a replica jaw of one of Britain’s earliest known domesticated dogs, dating to around 14,300 years ago and offering evidence of the long relationship between people and dogs.

Dr Doug Gurr, director of the NHM, said: “Reopening this remarkable gallery is an exciting moment for the museum.

“For the first time in over 80 years, visitors will be able to step into this beautiful historic space and explore our changing relationship with the natural world.

“It’s another important step in our NHM150 transformation as we create new spaces that inspire people to become advocates for the planet.”

Located on the second floor of the main museum’s Waterhouse building in South Kensington, the space historically served as both an osteology (skeleton) gallery and a mammals gallery.

After the museum’s original herbarium was damaged during the Second World War, the gallery was repurposed to house the botanical collections and closed to the public.

Its original wooden herbarium cabinets remain in place, reflecting its history as a working scientific collections space.

Content in Nature and Us is experimental and visitors can have their say and inform which stories will appear in the permanent gallery opening in 2029.