National Technical Museum

Prague's museum of machines, invention and industry, and the best rainy-day museum in the city for children and adults alike.

The museum was founded in 1908 and moved into its functionalist building on Letná in the early 1940s. Its centrepiece is the vast Transport Hall, where steam locomotives, classic cars including Czech Tatras and Škodas, motorcycles and bicycles fill the floor while aircraft hang from the glass roof above.

Other exhibitions cover astronomy, photography and film, printing, architecture, chemistry, household technology and measuring time. In the basement, a reconstructed coal and ore mine takes visitors underground on guided tours. The collections tell the story of the Czech lands as one of the great industrial regions of Central Europe, from the workshops of the Habsburg era to the factories of the First Republic.

The museum is on the edge of Letná Park, a short walk from the viewpoint over the bridges and the beer garden, and close to the Trade Fair Palace and DOX in Holešovice. Allow at least two to three hours. See the museums guide for how to combine it with other museums.