City of ideas

Today we don’t associate Manchester with car manufacturing, but in 1914 at the start of the First World War, it was one of the biggest motor manufacturing cities in the world.

Graphene was one of the breakthrough science stories of the new millennium. Hailed as a wonder material of the future, its remarkable physical properties have transformed the way we think about materials.

One major milestone in computing tends to be overlooked—and it took place right here in Manchester.

Discover what's in our Creative Industries collection, from promotional soap and matches to stop-motion puppets and an actual Dalek.

From slide rules to Douglas Hartree's differential analyser and Ferranti's early computers, these objects trace the development of calculating and computing technology.

From mankind's earliest dreams of flight to the wide-body aeroplanes of today, discover the absorbing story of flight in our Aeronautics collection.