Our View
The Powell-Cotton Museum, Quex House and Gardens offers an exciting, fun and interactive day out for all. Major Powell-Cotton (1866-1940) devoted his life to the study of the animals and many different cultures of Africa. This museum, founded in 1895, is his legacy, consisting of animal dioramas, ethnography, weaponry, archaeology, ceramics and artefacts from around the world. In "The Cube" visitors can handle over 400 objects. Also on display in Quex House, the family home, are collections of paintings, Eastern and Asian furniture, and English period furniture. There are also seven acres of gardens with woodland walks and a Victorian walled garden filled with unusual plants. Throughout the year there is also a programme of events, activities and temporary exhibitions.
Facilities – at a glance
Refreshments
Suitable for all child ages
Features
- Suitable for children of all ages
- Parking onsite
- Parking nearby
- Cafe
- Facilities: 2 wheelchairs available
- Accessible toilets
- Opening Times: Museum and Gardens open 10 Jan-17 Dec, Tue-Sun 10-5 (last entry 4.30). House open Apr-Oct, Tue-Sun 1-4
Also in the area
About the area
Discover Kent
The White Cliffs of Dover are an English icon – the epitome of our island heritage and sense of nationhood. They also mark the point where the Kent Downs AONB, that great arc of chalk downland stretching from the Surrey Hills and sometimes known as ‘the Garden of England’, finally reaches the sea. This is a well-ordered and settled landscape, where chalk and greensand escarpments look down into the wooded Weald to the south.
Many historic parklands, including Knole Park and Sir Winston Churchill’s red-brick former home at Chartwell, are also worth visiting. Attractive settlements such as Charing, site of Archbishop Cranmer’s Tudor palace, and Chilham, with its magnificent half-timbered buildings and 17th-century castle built on a Norman site, can be found on the Pilgrim’s Way, the traditional route for Canterbury-bound pilgrims in the Middle Ages.
In the nature reserves, such as the traditionally coppiced woodlands of Denge Wood and Earley Wood, and the ancient fine chalk woodland of Yockletts Bank high on the North Downs near Ashford, it is still possible to experience the atmosphere of wilderness that must have been felt by the earliest travellers along this ancient ridgeway.
Nearby stays
Places to Stay
Dining nearby
Restaurants and Pubs
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