I visited Twist Museum – London’s leading museum of illusions – and took more photos than I care to admit.
There’s nothing I love more than a perfect photo opportunity for the ‘gram, so the prospect of exploring mind-alternating immersive rooms and interactive illusions – and snapping the ‘ugliest’ photos possible – appealed to me no end!
Adventuring into the home of illusions
Located on bustling Oxford Street, and with a relatively small, unassuming shop front, Twist Museum occupies a huge underground exhibition space featuring optical illusions, interactive displays and seasonal exhibits.
Your experience starts as soon as you step into the street front gift shop, and descend the illuminated stairs into the gallery below.
First impressions of the gallery space? Fun! Despite being underground, the rooms felt airy, accessible and spacious with enticing bright colours and atmospheric lighting throughout.
As soon as you stroll through the rainbow-colour style arch, with illusions peeking through in the near distance, your journey has begun. From the Kaleidoscope Room with quirky photo opportunities, to the Sound Lab where you can put your hearing to the test and several other visual-altering and mind-boggling rooms, there are so many exciting installations to keep you busy during your time here.
I love the fact that the exhibits include helpful little information cards displayed next to them – it’s a great touch. The cards include short paragraphs on how best to view the illusion to get the full effect, or present questions and theories on the illusion to really get you thinking. It just shows that Twist Museum is not only entertaining but educational too.
What’s inside Twist Museum?
A bunch of funky, interactive installations just waiting to be explored – that’s what!
There are more than 60 interactive illusions and exhibits at Twist Museum, all with their own quirky ways of testing your perception on colour, perspective, shape, sound, heat and more. They were all great but the one’s that stood out for me include:
- The Kaleidoscope Room – This immersive space has several kaleidoscopes with constantly shifting colours and patterns. I spent most of my time in this room and the pictures and videos we took were hilarious. I’ve been banned from ever resurfacing those, but they’ll forever be on my phone for when I need a giggle and a pick-me-up.
- The 4D Booth – Another favourite exhibit of mine was the 4D Booth. Multiple cameras capture your image from different angles to create a detailed 3D headshot, which is rendered and displayed as an avatar on a digital screen within a matter of seconds. The 3D image is then magically transported into a spinning hologram – our results were hilarious.
- The Slanted Room – I also really enjoyed this intriguing room, which is designed to play tricks on your mind and body. The room is constructed with tilted floors and walls to create the illusion of gravity pulling you in unexpected directions.
I’ll be honest though, there was one installation where I let my curiosity get the better of me.
I was adamant it was some kind of magnetic magic suspending a chained-sculpture mid-air, so I touched one of the brackets ever so slightly and the exhibit sort of fell apart in my hands. With a deep burning red face resembling a tomato, I was luckily saved by another visitor who came to my aid to “fix” the sculpture, telling me he’d also let his curiosity get the better of him just moments before...
The experience concludes in a good ol’ gift shop. While there were some fun looking games and cool little knick knacks to browse, I don’t think the gift shop really added much to the overall experience.
Is Twist Museum worth visiting?
If you love immersive experiences and taking an obscene number of silly, warped photos to cry laugh at then yes, absolutely!
It’s also the perfect experience for family and friends of all ages to experience together, as the artwork and installations are family-friendly, interactive and above all enjoyable.
Experience it for yourself (and see if you can tame your curiosity...) by booking tickets to Twist Museum now.