Museum Fest: Explore What’s Next

Celebrate with us as we embark on a new journey! Enjoy everything the Florida Museum is today and learn how to connect with us around the community during our much-anticipated expansion project.

Museum Fest is all about the natural history we highlight every day here at the Florida Museum! Pick up native plants, talk with our scientists, get up-close views of our current research, tour Museum collections and more at this FREE celebration.

Food Trucks: B’z Gelati, Fat G’s BBQ and Catering

Florida Museum on the Go!

Meet our education team and find where we’ll be popping out in the community next! We have a lot of great pop-ups and programs planned around town while the exhibits building is closed. Check our calendar, follow us on social media or sign up for email to get updates on where you can find us.

Tour Our Collections

Get a special look into the McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity, one of the world’s largest butterfly and moth collections, with FREE tours at 11 a.m., Noon and 1 p.m.! Learn about the unique work that goes into conserving these beautiful insects from the experts that study them.

Tours limited to 25 participants on a first come first serve basis, sign in at the welcome table when you arrive.

Native Plant Giveaway

Our Daniels Lab is talking pollinators and giving away plants! Each visitor can choose one plant from a variety of native species, available on first come, first served basis until we’re out:

• Darrow’s blueberry

• Lyreleaf sage

• Largeflower false-rosemary

• East coast dune sunflower

• Simpson’s stopper

• Atlantic St. John’s wort

• Swamp twinflower
• Privet senna

Tabling Organizations

Meet scientists from the Museum and around campus! Learn about our collections and labs and check out what some of our colleagues are working on:

• Florida Museum Mammals Collection
• Florida Museum Fish Collection
• Florida Museum Vertebrate Paloentology Collection
• Kawahara Lab
• Shirey Global Change Lab
• Daniels Lab
• Blackburn Lab
• Ceramic Technology Lab
• Laboratory of Molecular Systematics & Evolutionary Genetics
• University of Florida Thompson Earth Systems Institute

Walk the exhibits

Whether you visit frequently or once a year, now is the time to walk through our exhibits and enjoy your favorite features! Stroll through a one-of-a-kind living Butterfly Rainforest, take a simulated glass-bottom boat ride and discover the fascinating history of the Sunshine State with real fossil favorites like the massive Megalodon jaws.

The last day to visit the exhibits before our expansion project is March 23, 2025!

While event activities are free, there is an admission charge for the Butterfly Rainforest exhibit.