Hungarian Electrical Engineering Museum


This place might not sound like everyone's cup of tea, but some of the exhibits are unusual (and quirky) enough to warrant a visit. The staff will also show you how the alarm system of the barbed-wire fence between Hungary and Austria worked before the fall of communism, and there's also an exhibit on the nesting platforms that the electricity company kindly builds for storks throughout the country, so they won't interfere with the wires and electrocute themselves.

There are tons of old household appliances (many still work), and colourful communist-era neon shop signs adorn the outside courtyard. The weirdest display is the collection of electricity-consumption meters, one of the largest in the world, which includes one installed in the apartment of 'Rákosi Mátyás elvtárs' (Comrade Mátyás Rákosi), the Communist Party secretary, on his 60th birthday in 1952, and another recalling Stalin's 70th birthday in 1948.

Transportation

  • bus: trolleybus 74
  • metro: M2 Astoria

Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby attractions

1. Orthodox Synagogue

0.04 MILES

Once one of a half-dozen synagogues and prayer houses in the Jewish Quarter, the Orthodox Synagogue was built in 1913 in what was at the time a very…

2. Holocaust Tree of Life Memorial

0.14 MILES

In the Raul Wallenberg Memorial Garden on the Great Synagogue’s north side, the Holocaust (or Emanuel) Tree of Life Memorial, designed by Imre Varga in…

3. Great Synagogue

0.18 MILES

Budapest's stunning Great Synagogue is the world's largest Jewish house of worship outside New York City. Built in 1859, the synagogue has both Romantic…

4. Hungarian Jewish Museum & Archives

0.19 MILES

Upstairs in an annexe of the Great Synagogue, this museum contains objects related to religious and everyday life, including 3rd-century Jewish headstones…

5. Rumbach Sebestyén utca Synagogue

0.19 MILES

The Moorish Rumbach Sebestyén utca Synagogue was built in 1872 by Austrian Secessionist architect Otto Wagner for the Status Quo Ante (moderate…

6. New Theatre

0.29 MILES

The New Theatre is a Secessionist gem – embellished with monkey faces above the entrance, globes and geometric designs – which opened as the Parisiana…

8. Makovec Office Building

0.35 MILES

This office block was designed by Imre Makovec (1935–2011), who developed his own 'organic' style using unusual materials like tree trunks and turf.

  • placement: superzone
  • path: Destinations/POIs/superzone
  • possible size: [970, 250], [970, 90], [728, 90], [1, 1],
  • targeting:
    {
      "url": "hungary/budapest/erzsebetvaros-and-the-jewish-quarter/attractions/hungarian-electrical-engineering-museum/a/poi-sig/1552929/1329734",
      "position": "superzone"
    }