Hotel and Restaurant Museum
Tallberginkatu 1 G, Helsinki, Finland, 00180
One of Finland’s quirkier museums, the Hotel and Restaurant Museum features exactly what you’d think: Museum displays cover the arrival of restaurants in Finland, the evolution of Finnish food, and the country’s complicated relationship with alcohol, which includes a long period of Prohibition in the 1920s. More modern elements include an interactive model kitchen, piped scents, film screenings, and workshops.
The basics
Learn about Finland’s history of food, dining, and tourism and admire furnishings, photographs, menus, and other items taken from restaurants, bars, diners, hotels and more. The museum’s interactive exhibitions include a 1950s-style hotel room and 1970s-style bar, a karaoke bar, and a “scent bar” where you can smell different cooking ingredients. A range of special events (in Finnish) spans the gamut from food art to scientific gastronomy via book clubs, while special exhibitions cover topics as quirky as food and drink tattoos.
You must purchase tickets to the Hotel and Restaurant Museum, but entrance is free for those under age 18 and discounted for seniors and students. Admission is included with the Helsinki Card and the Museum Card.
Things to know before you go
The Hotel and Restaurant Museum is a good choice for folks with an interest in Finnish food and drink.
Much, though not all, of the information in the museum is written in Finnish, meaning this will be a swift visit for many non-natives.
The museum is wheelchair-accessible, with the exception of the model kitchen, although some wheelchair users may need assistance to reach the elevator buttons. There are wheelchair-friendly bathrooms and parking.
How to get there
The Hotel and Restaurant Museum is in the Cable Factory cultural complex in Helsinki’s Ruoholahti district, about a 2-mile (3-kilometer) drive west of Helsinki Central Station. The Cable Factory is less than a 10-minute walk from Ruoholahti metro station (M1 and M2) and has its own tram stop.
When to get there
The Hotel and Restaurant Museum closes on Mondays and on Finnish national public holidays. The museum is open from late morning to evening the remainder of the week, with extended hours on Wednesdays. There’s free admission during the evening hours on the last Wednesday of the month.
About the Cable Factory
Once Finland’s biggest building (and later Nokia’s main factory), the Cable Factory became an artistic and commercial hub during the 1980s. The Hotel and Restaurant Museum is located here, along with the Theater Museum, the Finnish Museum of Photography, a public library, a rooftop sauna, and a wealth of design studios, galleries, and performance spaces.
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