Created by presidential decree in 1913, in its beginnings the National Museum of Cuba occupied three buildings that were inappropriate for exhibiting and preserving works of art, but in 1954, the collection moved to its permanent headquarters, the Palacio de Bellas Artes, a modernist edifice enhanced by sculptures of important Cuban artists, including Teodoro Ramos Blanco, Juan J. Sicre, Mateo Torriente and Rita Longa. Because of the expansion and diversification of its collection, the museum reopened in 2001 after a five-year period of extensive renovation work. The National Museum of Fine Arts is now divided into three buildings: the former Centro Asturiano for the Universal Art collection, the remodelled Militia Headquarters from colonial days for offices and storage, and the Palacio de Bellas Artes for the Cuban

The international collection of the museum was installed in 2001 in the former Centro Asturiano, a monumental Spanish Renaissance-style building built in 1927 at a cost of five million pesos, which in its construction included 1,250 tons of marble from Italy, Spain and the United States; terrazzo floors; and Cuban cedar and mahogany for the woodwork. The stained-glass ceiling that covers the stairwell and the 578 cast-bronze and Bohemian glass ornamental lamps were made in Spain. The art collection, divided into eight curatorial departments, includes works from Asia, United States, Great Britain, Italy, Spain, France, Flanders, Holland, Latin America and Germany. Donated to the museum by Dr. Joaquín Gumá Herrera, Count of Lagunillas, the ancient art collection, which is the largest in Latin America, includes

Tiene su sede desde 2001 en el monumental edificio del Centro Asturiano de La Habana, construcción atenida a códigos del eclecticismo español, levantada en 1927 a un costo de cinco millones de pesos, y en la cual se emplearon 1 250 toneladas de mármoles procedentes de Italia, España y Estados Unidos, 578 lámparas de bronce fundido, carpintería con maderas preciosas cubanas, entre otros ricos materiales.
La valiosa colección del Museo se reparte en 8 salas, dedicadas al arte de la antigüedad, al asiático, al estadounidense, al británico, al italiano, al español, al francés, al flamenco, al holandés, al latinoamericano y al alemán. Un espacio privilegiado ocupan las Salas de Arte de la Antigüedad, conformadas a partir de la colección que donara al museo el doctor Joaquín Gumá Herrera, conde de Lagunillas, la más grande de

Created in 1959, it is located since 1974 in the former Palacio Presidencial, a beautiful eclectic building designed by Cuban Rodolfo Maruri and Belgian Paul Belau, with the interior decoration entrusted to Tiffany of New York, which opened in 1920 as executive mansion. The permanent exhibitions cover the most important historical events and processes in Cuba since the first Spanish migrations to the present. Behind the museum, is the Memorial Granma, presided by the yacht in which Fidel Castro and 81 others sailed from Mexico to the south-eastern coast of Cuba in 1956 to launch the armed struggle against dictator Fulgencio Batista.

In Banes, to the north of the province of Holguín, on an area known as the “archaeological capital of Cuba", is found a 2,000m2-burial site of 56 aborigines together with material evidence extracted from the site that includes pieces of flint, pottery fragments, earrings made of shells and stones, handles in the form of animals and humans, mortars and plates, which belonged to small groups who lived in Cuba before the arrival of the Spanish conquerors. It is the only site-museum in the Caribbean and one of the very few in the world.

The former Palacio de los Capitanes Generales, a magnificent exponent of baroque architecture, built from 1776 to 1791 and facing the Plaza de Armas, served as headquarters of the Spanish Crown in colonial times until 1898, the US military administration from 1899 to 1902,  the Republic of Cuba from 1902 to 1920, and the Town Council from 1791 to 1966. In 1967 the building was restored on a grand scale to become the City Museum and is considered the onset of the restoration process of the Historical Centre of Havana. Its forty rooms exhibit the historical, ideological and cultural heritage of the nation. Especially emblematic are the Flag Hall, with the most significant banners throughout Cuban history; the rooms dedicated to the High Parrish Church, erected in 1577 on part of the site which is now occupied by the

This small neo-classical temple (1828), which houses three large oil paintings by French artist Jean Baptiste Vermay, a disciple of David, marks the spot where the first mass and town council were held in 1519. Two of Vermay’s paintings depict these two events, while the third is a portrayal of the blessing of the Templete on its inauguration. Outside the temple, the ceiba which perpetuates the founding of Havana, is visited every 16th November by thousands of Cubans who queue up to walk around the tree three times in silence, in the hope that their wishes are fulfilled. Also outside the Templete is the Columna Cagigal, erected in 1754 with the same commemorative purposes.

This museum was founded in 1925 in the house where Cuban national hero José Martí was born on 28 January, 1853. This modest early 19th-century house is a typical, small popular dwelling, with mortar walls, tile roof and very humble furnishings. Inside, family belongings, manuscripts and photographs, as well as a selection of Martí’s own personal objects, are on display.

Located on the emblematic Cathedral Square, the former mansion of Luis Chacón reopened in 1969 as the Colonial Art Museum for the exhibition and preservation of collections related to the life and customs of Colonial Cuba. Built in 1726, the building itself is a typical example of stately homes of Havana, with a central patio and galleries on all four sides of both floors. Valuable representative pieces are exhibited here: 17th, 18th and 19th-century furniture; glassware and dinner services; table linen and fans; colonial architectural elements, including wrought-iron grilles and railings, street lamps and lanterns, doorknockers, doors, stone and marble sculptures for facades, and especially, the multicoloured glasswork with stained-glass windows, inner doors, screens and ornamental partitions.

The Historical Centre of Trinidad, a World Heritage Site since 1988 together with the Valle de los Ingenios (Valley of Sugar Mills), is one of the most coherent and best preserved examples of domestic architecture during the colonial period in Latin America. The museum, located in the former residence of the Sánchez Iznaga family, treasures around two thousand historical, decorative and architectural pieces. Admirable are its translucent lamps, doors, wrought-iron and wooden grilles and railings, a characteristic of the

Founded in 1882 in the city of Matanzas by Doctors Triolet and Figueroa, and furnished with the finest equipment of the time for the preparation of therapeutic drugs, it became a museum in 1966, exhibiting a collection of formulas, patent medicine ads, stills, ovens, pillboxes, bronze moulds, scales, surgery and obstetrics instruments, disinfecting equipment, ampoules, and the beautiful porcelain and glass jars used to store chemicals, herbs, powders, and spices. Thanks to the wealth of its collection and the research and preservation work carried out, it is considered the most comprehensive of its type in Latin America.

It is the first museum to be founded in Cuba (1899, Santiago de Cuba) and since 1927 it is housed in a majestic eclectic edifice, with Neo-Classical elements, especially its façade. It has three exhibition halls: Art, which includes a collection of European paintings from the Museo del Prado in Madrid; History, with pieces associated with Cuban independence wars; and Archaeology, with exponents of pre-Columbian culture, including two Peruvian mummies, and specimens from ancient Egypt, with a mummy from the 18th Dynasty. The museum’s library has a large collection of manuscripts, musical scores, coin collections, and other examples of Cuba’s cultural and historical heritage.

The Castillo de San Pedro de la Roca, with medieval and Renaissance attributes, was completed in Santiago de Cuba in 1638 under the command of Italian engineer Juan Bautista Antonelli, who had already directed the construction of the Morro Fortress in Havana. The fortress was intended for warding off the constant attacks by pirates and corsairs in the region. This imposing fort, declared World Heritage in 1998, houses since 1978 the Piracy Museum, which illustrates the history of buccaneering in the Caribbean since the 16th century, through the exhibit of weapons and other related objects. 

One of the most important collections of Napoleonic and French Revolutionary memorabilia outside France, the museum is located in a house known as Dolce Dimora, a mansion in the style of a Florentine Renaissance villa, owned by Italian-Cuban politician Orestes Ferrara, and built in 1928 by renowned Cuba architects Govantes and Cabarrocas, who used abundant European glass, Italian marble and Cuban hardwoods. The museum, which opened in 1961, was created from the personal collections of Cuban tycoon Julio Lobo, who for years had a number of agents search abroad for pieces connected to Napoleon and the period in which he lived. The collection includes paintings, engravings, a library with over 5,000 books, papers, furniture, glassware, porcelains, and weapons. One of the most important pieces is the

When on one of his trips to Havana, Ernest Hemingway decided he needed a quiet place where he could write, he bought Finca Vigía, an early 20th-century estate where he lived from 1939 to 1960. A museum since 1964, it is located in a small town 15 miles outside the city and has been maintained exactly as its famous and last owner left it. The house amply demonstrate “Papa’s" many interests: bullfighting posters, fishing gear, hunting weapons, liquor bottles, hundreds of books and magazines, a typewriter, the “cat house", and many others. Nearby, his boat the Pilar, has been very well preserved.

The Museum and Memorial, which are part of a complex founded in 1988 in the city of Santa Clara, is composed also by a plaza and a tribune that includes historical monuments by Cuban sculptor José de Lázaro Bencomo (Delarra). The museum covers Ernesto Che Guevara’s life in chronological order, displaying personal belongings of the revolutionary leader, while the Memorial contains the mortal remains of the legendary guerrilla fighter and of several of his comrades from Bolivia. Their bodies were recovered and returned to Cuba  30 years after Che’s death in 1967, thanks to an intensive and painstaking search.

This magnificent mansion, once owned by María Luisa Gómez Mena, countess of Revilla Camargo―a wealthy patron of Cuban artists and inspirer of Teresa, a character in Alejo Carpentier’s novel La consagración de la primavera―is home since 1964 to the Museum of Decorative Arts. In its exhibition halls and storage rooms there are over thirty thousand works of art which include Louis XV and XVI period furniture; 17th to 19th-century Chinese crystal and folding panels; 16th to 20th-century Oriental pieces; Chantilly, Meissen, Sevres, Limoge, Staffordshire, Wedgwood and Faenza porcelains, gold and silver articles; lamps by Tiffany; clocks… and paintings, engravings and tapestries that cover the museum’s walls.

Created in 1990, the Museum of Ceramics was first housed inside the Castillo de la Real Fuerza, until 2005 when it moved to the Casa Aguilera, a beautiful mansion that was completely remodelled in 1728 by its second owner, who gave it the elegance it still boasts. The first floor of the museum is dedicated to temporary exhibits, while the top floor displays a comprehensive panorama of Cuban artistic ceramics from 1959 to the present. Every year, the museum organizes the Ceramics Biennial “Amelia Peláez", which focuses on sculptures and installations, while every other year, an event dedicated to vessels―pots, jugs, bowls, pitchers, etc―is held.

The former Banco Mendoza―built in 1915 by Morales y Mata, a Cuban firm of architects―whose façade is typical of the somewhat dramatic architecture of 20th century banks, is today home to the Numismatic Museum, an appropriate setting for the display of a valuable collection of over sixty thousand pieces which includes notes, a number of beautiful medals, and coinage dating back to the 7th century B. C. , plus the most comprehensive exhibit of Cuban currency issues. Valuation services are also provided.

It is the only Cuban installation dedicated to the preservation and exhibit of collections associated with tobacco culture, from its cultivation to the industrial processing. The museum illustrates not only the complex process of making the world-famous habanos, but also its packaging, with the exquisite golden lithographic prints which have characterized cigar boxes since the 19th century. On the premises is the Casa del Habano which sells cigars and other articles for smokers.

Considered by Dr. Eusebio Leal Spengler, Historian of the City of Havana, “indispensable for the culture and history and the modern age of Cuba", the railway has always been linked to the evolution of the Island and the development of a large part of its cities and towns ever since it was first introduced early in 1837; hence the importance of this museum, opened in 2002 and housed in the old Cristina Train Station, which dates back to 1859. The museum exhibits a collection of communication, signalling and track equipment; locomotive engines from different periods, including La Junta, which was brought to Cuba in 1843 and is considered by experts the most original, best-preserved in the Americas; different types of freight cars and coaches; and the furnishings of a typical 1920s train station. Visitors can also take train rides. Advance booking required.