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The Natural History Museum has announced it is reopening a gallery that shut its doors more than eight decades ago.
The London attraction has revealed that its historic gallery, which has remained off-limits since the height of the Second World War in 1943, will welcome visitors once again from September 16.
The newly unveiled Nature and Us exhibition will allow the public to step inside the long-shuttered space and explore humanity's changing relationship with the natural world through 50 extraordinary objects.
Among the highlights will be a miniature model of a Crystal Palace dinosaur, revealing how Victorian scientists and artists imagined prehistoric creatures, and the skeleton of a monk seal named Jenny, which serves as a reminder of an era when wild animals were exploited for public entertainment.
Visitors will also be able to see a Star Wars toy from the 1980s covered in marine organisms, demonstrating how nature can transform everyday objects over time, alongside a 400,000-year-old hand axe that reshaped understanding of Britain's earliest humans.
A replica jaw from one of Britain's oldest known domesticated dogs, dating back around 14,300 years, will also be available for visitors to touch.
The reopening forms part of the museum's ambitious NHM150 transformation programme, which will see a new or refurbished gallery unveiled every year ahead of its 150th anniversary in 2031.
Located on the second floor of the museum's Waterhouse building in South Kensington, the gallery previously housed skeleton and mammal displays before being converted into storage for botanical collections after the museum's herbarium suffered wartime damage.
The Natural History Museum has announced it is reopening a gallery that shut its doors more than eight decades ago
The Natural History Museum's gallery was previously an osteology space in 1893
The gallery previously housed skeleton and mammal displays before being converted into storage for botanical collections after the museum's herbarium suffered wartime damage
Many of the original wooden herbarium cabinets remain intact, offering visitors a glimpse into the space's scientific past.
Dr Doug Gurr, director of the Natural History Museum, said: 'Reopening this remarkable gallery is an exciting moment for the museum.
'For the first time in over 80 years, visitors will be able to step into this beautiful historic space and explore our changing relationship with the natural world.
'It's another important step in our NHM150 transformation as we create new spaces that inspire people to become advocates for the planet.'
The exhibition will run for an initial 18 months, with visitors invited to share their views and help shape the permanent version of the gallery, due to open in 2029.
It comes after the Natural History Museum usurped the British Museum as the UK's most popular landmark and attraction for tourists.
For the last two years, the British Museum in London has been the most popular site, attracting 6.5million visitors in 2024 and 5.8million in 2023.
The public museum features over eight million works and is dedicated to two million years of history.
But figures in March by the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA) reveal another spot took the crown.
The Natural History Museum is the UK's top tourist attraction for 2025.
Last year, a whopping 7.1 million visitors explored its vast range of exhibits – a record-breaking number of visits for any museum or gallery in a year.
The figure is also an impressive 13 per cent increase from 2024, which saw 6.3 million visitors.
Guests to the Natural History Museum can gaze at the impressive 25-metre blue whale skeleton named Hope which is suspended in the central hall.