Perak Museum, Taiping Overview

Regarded as one of the oldest museums in Malaysia, Perak Museum is a small public museum that stands as a landmark to the city of Taiping. It was founded by Sir Hugh Low, the fourth British Resident of Perak in 1883. This athenaeum is stacked with a whooping 8474 displays out of which 5074 are cultural collections, 523 nature-based, and 2877 miscellaneous collections.

Initially, this exhibition centre showcased artifacts based on ethnography, zoology, botany, and geology. The artworks here are segregated into four galleries called Nature Gallery, Cultural Gallery, Indigenous People Gallery, and Temporary Gallery. Rich in archaeological art pieces, this exhibition center includes some hundred-year-old collections of animal species such as binturong and pulasan, animal skeletons, and extinct smoked clay. The Perak Museum boasts of ancient British style art deco architecture. You can combine your visit to Perak Museum with Taiping Lake Garden and Taiping zoo.

Galleries at the Perak Museum

This 140-year old storehouse gives the best insight into ancient British architecture. The artifacts and collections here are split into 4 different galleries.

Nature Gallery: This gallery displays skeletons of animals like tigers and elephants. Also, there is much taxidermy highlighted with animals stuffed in jungle dioramas.

Cultural Gallery: Here Malaysian handicrafts like woven bamboo items from Perak are displayed. Other exhibits of the cultural gallery include Mannequins wearing typical costumes worn at Malay, Indian and Chinese weddings.

Indigenous People Gallery: This art gallery draws attention to the lifestyle and physical characteristics of the Orang Asli community. This gallery also holds a fantastic collection of some indigenous masks. You will also find old-style earthen pottery and utensils in this gallery.

Temporary Gallery: It rotates some of the unseen exhibits of the museum.

Exhibits at Perak Museum

Perak museum greatly displays animal, bird, fish, snail, and herbarium species in British styled dioramas.
It displays traditional industrial clay works like “labu”, “geluk”, “belanga”, “pasu bucung”, “buyung”, “kukusan”, “perasapan”. These exhibits have completed more than 100 years of age.
The Clay and Indigenous gallery plethorically hold amazing handicrafts assembled by the indigenous people of the Proto Malay, Negrito, and Senoi clans. Perak is a Malaysian state housing the above-mentioned tribes. Some exhibits of these indigenous people in the repository include the amazing creation of clothes from wood pulp, mannequins, masks, and traditional music instruments.
The Cultural gallery houses some rare and fantastic handiworks, handicrafts, and weavings of the Malaysian people like the unique weaving made by the Sultan of Perak’s mother. Weavings of the tudung saji (food cover), "tikar pandan dan mengkuang" (pandan and mengkuang mats), and some baskets are showcased in this part of the museum.
The basement of the museum is home to some vintage cars like a Rolls Royce Silver Cloud 1964, Rolls Royce Phantom 1972, Alvis TD21 Tourer 1960. You will also find a 1930s Bedford Lorry that was initially an ambulance but was later on operated as a hearse by the Taiping Muslim Community Association.
Other displays include a carriage of the Perak State Railway Company, a 19th-century steam engine, a Malaysian air force jet fighter, and an old anchor reclaimed from the Straits of Malacca.

How To Reach Perak Museum

Perak Museum is easily accessible by taxi. If you are in Taiping town, then grab a taxi from any taxi stand that will leave you at the Perak museum within a couple of minutes. This taxi ride will cost you RM 9 - RM 11. If you own a personal car, then you can directly drive to reach this museum. In case you don’t have a car, you can also choose to rent a car.