I broke the Guinness World Record for most museum visits in a single day – this is what I learned

Ben Melham loves museums. He always has. Some of his earliest memories involve school trips to museums. And now he is making new memories – and breaking world records – for visiting museums.  

He’s a man on a mission to remind people of the range of museums in the UK, the joys and stories they contain, and that we should cherish these special places – because times have been tough since lockdown saw visitor numbers plummet.  

Last year, Melham made history – setting an official Guinness World Record for visiting the most museums in a single day. There were strict rules – he must see at least one artefact in each one, visit during regular opening hours, sign in at each different venue, get photographic and video evidence and be GPS-tracked all the way.  

“My daughter had got the Guinness Book of World Records for Christmas, so that’s where it all started,” he says. “I was chatting with her and my son Henrik, and I said I could get a world record. They didn’t believe it was possible – in their eyes, they were for special people, superheroes.  

“And I like museums, do a lot of work in them. So I looked on the Guinness website and all the world records are listed, and you can see what they are. So I looked and saw that there was already a world record for most museums in one day – I think it was 22 at the point when I applied. It got broken and was up to 33 while I was preparing. But it felt like something I could do. In the end I managed 42!” 

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Melham travelled on foot and kick scooter. He plotted a course that began at the Royal Pharmaceutical Society Museum in London and took in everything from the Tower of London to the Bank of England, Guildhall Art Gallery and the Dickens Museum before ending in South Kensington at the V&A, Natural History Museum and Science Museum. 

Melham was racing against the clock. But he pushes back, he says, against the idea that shorter visits are not valuable.  

“I think one of the barriers to people going to museums is that they feel their visit has to be really worthy. And they have to spend five hours there, or see and read everything,” he says.  

“But if you want to go to one room, see one thing, maybe get a coffee in the museum cafe and have a mooch around the shop – that still counts. That is still a museum visit. And it is still fun.  

“Now I’m trying to set the one-year world record, I get to spend more time in these places. I’m up to 165 so far.” 

Melham explains how there are more than 2,000 museums registered in the UK. And that city centre museums have been hardest hit by the reduction in visitor numbers since the pandemic.  

“We are so lucky in this country,” he says. “And what my mission is all about, really, is letting people know the diversity of these museums. I think museums are storytellers. And the most impactful museum visits are the ones where you connect with a story – it might be a physical or personal connection with your history or your past or your community. Or it might just be an amazing story about an amazing object.   

“My earliest memories are of going on school trips to the Natural History Museum and seeing the big blue whale model. That iconic thing stuck in my mind. If there was one thing that stuck with me from the world record it was the Bank of England Museum – where you can hold a gold bar worth hundreds of thousands of pounds.  

“Because museums are not just full of dusty objects. They’re about learning and engaging and being inspired, they are about finding your place in the world. And they are places for everyone.” 

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