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Location
Best time
Visit on weekday mornings or during off-peak seasons to avoid crowds in the smaller historic houses, which have single entrance/exit doors and can feel cramped when busy. Winter evenings are beautiful but particularly crowded.
Visitor tip
Book guided tours in advance to enhance your experience—the knowledgeable docents and interpreters provide valuable context about the 350+ years of history represented across the buildings, including the important Cousins Apartment exhibit about Black family life in 1930s-40s Portsmouth.
Visitor tip
Combine your visit with the adjacent downtown Portsmouth waterfront area, making it a walkable historic district experience. The museum's location near the water makes it easy to explore complementary attractions in the same visit.
About Strawbery Banke Museum
Large, outdoor living-history museum. Outdoor living-history museum on 10 acres featuring numerous buildings, gardens & crafts.
Quick Facts
- Type
- Historic House Museum
- Location
- Portsmouth, New Hampshire waterfront neighborhood
- Time Period
- 350+ years of history, Indigenous to present day
- Highlights
- Historic houses, costumed interpreters, traditional crafts, gardens, summer camps
- Recognition
- USA Today #7 Best Open Air Museum, TripAdvisor Award of Excellence, Best Museum in New Hampshire
What visitors say
Strawbery Banke is lovely decorated for the holidays, and on a crisp winter night, it is a wonderful experience. The only rub is that it is so popular that it can get quite crowded, especially in the smaller houses that have only one…
Very cool Historic museum which is right downtown near the water. Very walkable and I really enjoyed that this museum is basically an entire historic district which is still intact amongst the down town area. Such a cool experience!
This is an excellent place to visit for history and culture in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The buildings are well preserved, and it’s really fun to walk around and visit all of the buildings and see the exhibits inside. It’s definitely a…
From 1,544 Google reviews
Did You Know?
- Strawbery Banke Museum spans more than 350 years of history on 10 acres, including Indigenous history through the present day, making it a comprehensive living history of Portsmouth's evolution
- The museum features the Cousins Apartment, a unique exhibit documenting the lived experience of a Black family in 1930s-1940s Portsmouth, providing rare historical perspective on African American life in this era
- The museum hosts a U.S. Naturalization Ceremony on July 4th, making it an active civic gathering space that connects historical education with contemporary citizenship experiences
More Family Fun Nearby
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