Please Touch Museum: Philadelphia, PA

Photo credit: Trip Advisor

We had the amazing opportunity to check out the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia Pennsylvania this past weekend. They had sent me 4 free admission tickets to come check out everything the museum has to offer and let you all know about it. Pennsylvania weather has been really rainy and chilly lately so it was a pretty wet trip. Because of this, I couldn't get a good picture of the front of the museum, but as you can see from the photo above, the museum is HUGE. There's paid ($8) parking right beside the museum, but there were people parked along the street as well. 

The lobby of the museum is gorgeous and very impressive. This gigantic Lady Liberty torch was plastered in toys and signs. The dome above it is breathtaking. As soon as you walk in the doors they have access to a coat room, as well as restrooms, the Please Taste Cafe, and the gift shop. You don't need to pay to access the cafe or the gift shop. Once you pay for admission into the museum, then you can explore the rest of the museum which is divided into two floors. 

One of the rooms has tables and this large, beautiful carousel, which I had problems getting photos of because of it moving, but the kids loved it. The photos don't really show how big this carousel is, but it's really impressive. 

One of the rooms was full of water activities for the kids. They provided them with little smocks and they could play with boats and duckies and all kids of water toys. There are also hand dryers through out the area so they can dry off when they are finished playing. 

The opposite side of the museum on the first floor housed a really neat "city" play area where the kids could pretend to drive buses and cars as well as be mechanics in the Please Touch Garage. There was a full size Scion for the kids to play in and buildings, one of which actually housed the elevator) for decoration. There was also a park area as well.

Downstairs, they had my favorite exhibit which is the Wonderland exhibit and from the amount of people, I am going to guess it's their most popular. Once you walk inside the story book there's a little maze with mirrors and little windows to look in. One window had a little pastry in it and another had a long hallway to nowhere.

There is a ton of detail in this museum, but they definitely spent extra time on detail in the Wonderland exhibit. You can look down into the big Wonderland tree from the first floor and there's even a Cheshire cat hidden in the tree. Walking along the shrubbery maze around the big tree, there are many cute statues and fun little things to look at. 

Probably my absolute favorite thing in the entire museum was the "Painting the roses red" section. The kids can use a special paint brush to paint the white roses and they magically turned red. The roses only turn red if you use the paint brush. Both of my kiddos were so engaged in this activity as were the other little ones around. I have to say that this had to have been a pretty popular part of the exhibit. 

Also downstairs is a separate room called the Centennial Exhibition. This room had many historical exhibits in it. The photos above are from a little exhibit built to look like a house. When you look in the window, there's a mannequin of a little girl wearing historical clothing and little historical elements through out. This part, was slightly creepy. Walking by, you see the image of a girl out of the corner of your eye and then realize she's not moving. I thought it was a real little girl at first until I saw the mannequin had no face. It's still really cool to look at none the less.

There's also a large glass case with a model town in it and a little pretend train station and train as well as toy trains and toy train tracks. My kids really loved these 3D picture viewers. 

Through out the museum, there are display cases of vintage toys. This slinky display case is located outside of the Centennial exhibit entrance, and beside the case on the right is a large screen that shows little historical documentaries. You can sit on the benches and enjoy an educational film while you are there. 

There were many rooms down stairs that just had tables and chairs in there. Those rooms are used for special events that they hold often where children can sit in on story time and art projects. 

A large part of the downstairs is set up like a little town with shops that your child can pretend to work in. There's a huge grocery store, a McDonalds (although the sign has been taken down it's still evident that it's a McDonalds), a hospital, shoe store, and more.

This was another one of my favorite exhibits. Here, your kids can pretend to be part of a film crew filming a scene from a movie about Noah's Ark. The screens are fully functional and when your child moves the camera, whatever they focus on, will be on the screen.

Upstairs, there's two big space themed rooms. The rooms had 4 display cases full of Star Wars memorabilia and on the walls were all the classic posters from all of the Star Wars films. This was my husband's favorite part. 

I wasn't able to get great pictures in the space themed rooms because it was a might bit crowded, but here's a photo of a rocket ship inside one of the rooms and in the background, you can see another one of their vintage toy display cases. The two display cases in this room housed vintage dolls and action figures. 

This room seemed to be another popular one. In this room, the kids can make rocket ships by connecting pieces of foam rockets and then in the corner of the room they could launch their rocket into the air, trying to get them in one of the hoops in the center of the room. To launch their rocket, your child places the rocket ship on the launch peg and then holds down a button that pumps the station full of air. Once they get enough air, they hit the launch button and off flies their rocket. 

The ceiling in this room had a solar system hanging from it, which was really awesome. 

We got on the road late and didn't arrive at the museum until 3 in the afternoon and the museum closes at 5, so we were unable to check out their large gift shop, but they sell a lot of educational toys and books. 

Normally, the Please Touch Museum has outdoor exhibits as well, but since it was pouring down rain the entire day, we didn't get a chance to check that part out. Naturally though, we were so impressed with the museum and our kids had so much fun, that we will definitely be going back again. Tickets are $17 per person and free for any child under the age of one year. It's totally worth the price and I would suggest getting there early so you can have enough time to experience it all and yours kiddos can have a chance to play. Because we were working on a time constraint, our kids were kind of rushed from exhibit to exhibit to give other kids a chance to play as well. 

The museum even hosts wedding receptions as well as birthday parties! 

If you are in the Philadelphia area or are looking for a fun road trip this summer, check out the Please Touch Museum. 

Like them on Facebook and visit their website at www.pleasetouchmuseum.org for more information on upcoming events. 

*Disclaimer: I was give complimentary tickets to this location in exchange for my honest review. My opinion was not influenced by this and all opinions are 100% my own.*