SeaCity Museum is an interesting stopover if you have some extra time in Southampton, but it is far…read morefrom a "must-see" attraction.
As far as museums go, it is your typical mid-sized town museum, and certainly not to the scope of the Met or Museum of Natural History or anything of the sort. You're looking at perhaps an hour and a half to two hours tops, so do keep this in mind before forking over your hard earned £12.69 for entrance.
The headliner is undoubtedly the Titanic exhibit, which if you are a fan of the history and/or the movie, might lure you in. Southampton is the port where the ship took its inaugural voyage from, so there is an obvious vested interest.
However, if you are in town as the starting point for your own cruise, viewing this beforehand might be a bit unsettling. I suppose you could always come after you have returned though.
The Titanic display is shown in a storybook format, introducing a smattering of crew members (some important, some random), and there is no mention or connection to the movie. Over the course of the exhibit, we are drawn to the characters, learning their lifestories and trials and tribulations, as if reading a book or watching a film. This is purposely done to invoke a rooting interest in how things ultimately pan out for them.
One thing I do find odd is that only this handful of characters is emphasized, with nary a mention of the countless other crew members, nor the passengers.
In any event, the storytelling is compelling, and the photographs, artifacts, detailed mock-ups, interactive booths, etc. are just enough to keep visitors entertained and educated, even those who were not huge fans to begin with, such as yours truly.
The rest of the museum is much smaller, and mostly about Southampton itself. It is still definitely worth your time though, especially if this is your first time in town. One of the displays showcases the history of the city and its inhabitants over time, and the other focuses more on the transportation aspect in and out of the city, since Southampton has always been a traditional transit hub, be it for commerce or leisure. The detailed model ships are definitely a highlight.
The only downer is the head curator being quite rude to guests. Before our time was up, she was barking at visitors to GTFO, and even gave us a countdown to how much time we had remaining. When I made it to the gift shop, she told everyone we had less than a minute, and to hurry up and buy, as if we were in Menace II Society.
We understand that she wants to go home, and get back to doing whatever she's got going on, but there is absolutely no need for such a condescending tone to customers who paid good money to be there. It's not as if everyone was just milling about and loitering or anything. Any chance of a sale in their gift shop was completely nullified.
The rest of the employees are great, however. They actually gave me that apologetic look, as if they already knew their boss was like this, so I am thankful to them.
Fortunately, this didn't completely ruin the wonderful SeaCity Museum experience for me, but it certainly did leave a slight black mark.
Cliff's Notes: Check it out of you are a fan of the Titanic (maybe not before your own cruise though) and/or Southampton history. Everyone else should just spend the time exploring Southampton itself instead.
