This place was on my list to visit the next time we were in town. We popped in on a Saturday…read moremorning and it turned out there was no charge since they only had the beer exhibit on the first floor. Normally $8. You can park free on the street in front on Saturdays. The building itself is stunning and worth it. The vaults are incredible. The beer exhibit is very detailed and very informative. I am not sure what would normally be on the second floor but they said there was a wedding later that day - there are many weddings here on Saturdays. I was hoping for more.

Love, love, love this spot! If you want to learn more about Milwaukee County history, this is the…read moreplace to go. They have thoughtfully curated exhibits that are periodically changed. The main exhibit might be up for a 2-3 years and then there's a new neighborhood exhibit series that is set to change up more frequently. I visited my first time during Milwaukee Museum week so admission was FREE. But I would pay full admission ($8) if you really want a deep dive into Milwaukee. When I dropped in, the beer exhibit was up so everything displayed related to Milwaukees's beer culture and history. It was FASCINATING. There's also an actual bank vault inside the building that was used in the filming of the movie, Public Enemies, with Johnny Deep. You can walk inside the vault. The space is also worth mentioning - lots of marble. It's just a fun place to escape to. I recommend you plan to spend at least two hours here if you want to really read all the information on display and see all the artifacts. Parking might be tricky - street parking is the way to go if you can find a spot.

Truly outstanding! Eclectic body of work and well curated. I've visited several galleries in that…read moredistrict and this was by far my favorite one. Next time I'm in town I'll definitely stop by:)

Absolutely fantastic! I think this is the best gallery I've seen in Milwaukee. Only professional…read moreartists are exhibiting here. I plan on returning soon.

I love the Racine Heritage Museum. It's an adorable little museum with great exhibits about…read moreRacine's amazing past. It really shows you what an important town Racine was. I also enjoy how the exhibits change regularly. It seems whenever I pop in there is something new to check out. The only part of the museum that I haven't been in yet is the archives. It seems like when every I visit it is closed. I'd really like to make it in there to look up some history on my house!

This is a small, freemuseum. It has some interesting exhibits. It is laid out in a fairly confusing…read moreway and the quality of the exhibits varies widely. However it is free and right across from the parking garage!

We came to the planetarium for a "Salsa Under the Starts" event which we learned about via the…read morePlanetarium e-newsletter. It was a free event open to the public. Programming at the Planetarium tends to be great for people of all ages including children. The event was well attended, and two free planetarium shows were offered. The stargazing show was about 30 mins and very informative. We both learned something new about the night sky and left excited to try to spot some new constellations on our next camping trip up north. After the stargazing show, we were able to head up to the rooftop of the Planetarium to check out Jupiter and Saturn on the mega-telescope. Seeing the planets was a treat and worth the wait - there were a lot of students there for extra credit, so we had to wait maybe 30 mins to be able to scope out both planets. There is a suggested donation of $5 when you visit and they also ask for you to "sign-in" so they can track where visitors come in from, etc. It was a worthwhile visit. Something off the beaten path, low-key and educational.

This was smaller than I thought but very cool looking inside. The seats were nice and comfy and I…read morethoroughly enjoyed the stargazing. I do now realize that I will never survive if I have to use the stars as reference points. I needed to use Siri to give me directions to the Planetarium and I still got lost. The stars sure were beautiful though and make we want to travel to Alaska so I can see the Northern Lights. I did find a few contellations though and thought the presentatin was fun and informative.

Awesome experience, and well ran. Lots of art both local and international. Also plenty of…read moreperforming arts to listen to and watch as well.

OFA is a yearly event that takes place at the lovely Fowler Park in Oconomowoc, WI. It features…read morenumerous artists (local and out of towners) selling their arts and crafts. They feature such mediums as : ceramics, glass, jewelry, painting, photography, woodwork, and sculpture. They offer a shuttle for off-site parking, which is a very convienent way to come and walk around, enjoy the fest, and not have to worry about walking 'all the way back to the car.' They also offer entertainment for the kids, like a youth stage, playgrounds, entertainers, and petting zoos. Oconomowoc Festival of the Arts has been around for 40+ years and offers art from more than 130 artists! It's worth your while to check out - spend a day in beautiful Oconomowoc and support a good cause while you're at it. BTW : This year's OFA will be held on August 17th and 18th, 2013 from 10am - 5pm.

We drove from Madison to Racine for the glass exhibit. It was our first time visiting Racine and…read moreRAM (Racine Art Museum). Plenty of parking and there was a big garden with a few sculptures. Admission is free and there were lots of children's art work in the hallway. The actually glass exhibit was very small like inside a small room with less than 10 pieces of glasswork. Had to say that we weren't impressed especially the almost 2 hours drive. However, if you live in Racine, it may be worth to swing by.

Our neighbor had a couple paintings in the annual Watercolor exhibit so we made the trek to Racine…read moreto check it out. First we went to the downtown location of RAM not knowing there were two locations. After paying for parking and to enter that museum we found out that watercolors were at this sister location. (We did tour the main museum and really enjoyed the special Easter peep contest entries - lots of fun). We eventually made it back out of downtown to this location with free admission and free parking. We enjoyed the watercolor exhibit itself - some great works but the gallery and facility was a bit underwhelming and small but for the price...

Kids had a random day off, and that means museums! But it's a pandemic and in winter and this was…read moreseriously the only museum I could find that was open. But we like small museums too, so off we go. There is free street parking, but it's hard to figure out where the entrance is. It's off Main Street on the little drop-off loop, up a few stairs and under the "WAUKESHA COUNTY" sign. Inside there's a desk with a volunteer selling admission, except we were lucky and it was a free day! We still donated some money though. Part of the museum was closed for renovations. They're planning a big birthday exhibition soon. Most of the museum is the typical stuff you'd get at a historical society (including a research library), but the standout here is the Les Paul room. I thought it was very well done; the kids and I all liked it and learned a lot about out local guitar engineer. Definitely worth a trip out here atleast once. Plus it's a cute little town and even an after-museum walk along the Fox in winter is enjoyable.

Somewhere there's music How faint the tune…read moreSomewhere there's heaven How high the moon At the Waukesha County Museum, the music can be found high up on the 3rd floor, for this is the permanent home and exhibit of Waukesha's most famous son: Les Paul, aka, The Wizard of Waukesha. It's hard for me to put in words how much I respect Les Paul. He was a genius on so many fronts: guitarist extraordinaire, singer, songwriter, comedian, inventor, innovator and all around good guy. Not a day goes by in our lives where something we see or hear was not influenced by his technical advancements. Did you hear recorded music today? Les pioneered multi-track recording. How about Led Zeppelin? Jimmy Page's preferred electric guitar was a Gibson Les Paul. For that matter, if you heard rock and roll today, somewhere, somehow, Les's influence was there. So to be able to fork over only $7 to see some of Les's personal artifacts and mementos is a great deal to me. The museum has some other interesting artifacts too. In the Winter of 2014, the first floor exhibited items from the American Civil War. A few of the items were downright harrowing: whips, ball and chain, shackles--how could humans have done this to one another? And while it's not a huge museum--you can see the entire thing, thoroughly, in about 3 hours--it's a great way to while away a Saturday or Sunday winter afternoon. It's also in a building which is an interesting artifact itself--the former Waukesha County Courthouse built in 1893. My suggestion: start at the bottom and work your way up. You'll be saving the best part--the Les Paul exhibit--for last. The Waukesha County Museum. The best reason to visit Waukesha since spring water. Note: Waukesha was known as Spring City. People traveled from around the world to sip its water with "miraculous healing powers." Today that water has, for the most part, been replaced by Miller Lite.

I was in Milwaukee for just a day on a Monday, and was excited to see that the Jewish Museum was…read moreopen (as a lot of places aren't). I'm not local, but I really enjoyed seeing how the local Jewish community began and grew over the years, from the businesses to the famous people, and all the Judaica. Their special exhibit now is about people who kept written works, Jewish texts, and other culturally important documents away from the Nazis. Learning about their stories and the work they did was inspiring. It's an affordable place to visit and I recommend stopping in.

I try to visit Jewish sites in cities that I visit, so when my husband and I were exploring…read moreMilwaukee this past weekend, we visited the Jewish Museum in Milwaukee. It's a small museum, but we really enjoyed the permanent collection (about the Jewish community of Milwaukee) and the temporary exhibit about Marc Chagall's Le Cirque series. The Chagall tapestry that hangs on a wall of the museum is also completely stunning. It isn't a huge museum, but it was a nice place to stop for a quick visit. I feel like I know a lot more than I did before about the Jewish museum in Milwaukee!