Manchester City have set a date for their new Museum Experience at the Etihad Campus: it opens on Monday 14 December, and the first thing visitors will walk into is a temporary exhibition on the career of Pep Guardiola.
The club confirmed the opening on Tuesday, with tickets already on sale. Prices start at £20 per adult, and there are add-ons for anyone who wants more than the museum itself, including VIP stadium tours and matchday pitch walk tours.
It is a fitting way to start. Guardiola managed City from 2016 to 2026, and he is widely seen as one of the most influential figures the game has produced. Opening the doors with his story, only months after he handed over to Enzo Maresca, tells you how the club want the last decade to be remembered.
What is inside the Man City museum?
The museum covers more than 1,700 square metres. Alongside the Guardiola exhibition, visitors will find original memorabilia, interactive technology and recreated environments from across the club’s history.
That history goes a long way back. There are references to the club’s foundation in 1880 and to the Maine Road years in Moss Side, where City played from 1923 to 2003.
The headline attraction for most fans will be the silverware. All 49 of the club’s major trophies will be on display up close, a collection that includes the years when Vincent Kompany was lifting titles as captain and the Guardiola era that followed.
There is also a 360-degree immersive cinema showing some of City’s greatest moments, and PUMA Arena challenges where visitors can test their own football skills.
Who designed it, and where is it?
The museum was designed by Ralph Appelbaum Associates (RAA), the firm behind The Crown Jewels Exhibition at the Tower of London and the London Transport Museum. That is serious pedigree for a football club project.
It sits inside Medlock Square, the £300m entertainment district next to the Etihad Stadium. The square already has Radisson Blu’s The Medlock hotel and new restaurants including Zadies and Little Beasts, so the museum adds a daytime reason to visit on non-matchdays too.
Jeremy Maxton, Director of Visitor Attractions at Manchester City Football Club, said: “The Museum Experience has been designed as a destination that goes beyond just the pitch. Whether you’re a lifelong supporter, visiting Manchester for a weekend, or simply looking for a unique day out, we’ve created an experience that offers something for everyone.”
He added: “From the recreated environments and original memorabilia to the interactive elements, there are different ways into the Club’s history throughout the Museum. We’ve also built in space for new stories to be added over time, so the experience can continue to evolve. It’s been a huge project to bring together and we’re looking forward to people seeing it for themselves later this year.”
A museum for the past, while Maresca writes the next chapter
The timing is interesting. City open a museum built around their greatest era just as Maresca’s side go through a sticky patch, with two Premier League defeats in a row leaving them three points behind leaders Arsenal before Wednesday’s Champions League trip to RB Leipzig, where another former City title winner, Martin Demichelis, is in the opposite dugout.
Starting with Guardiola is the right call. He is the reason that trophy cabinet looks the way it does, and a temporary exhibition on him will pull in plenty of fans who never made it to Maine Road. Maxton’s “space for new stories” line is the part Maresca will want to read twice: the museum has room for more, and it is now his job to fill it.
