Calouste Gulbenkian Museum

The Calouste Gulbenkian Museum on Avenida de Berna holds one man's collection, kept together as he assembled it. Calouste Sarkis Gulbenkian spent more than fifty years buying around six thousand works, guided by his own taste and advised by the leading specialists of his day, and the Foundation that carries his name puts roughly a thousand of them on the gallery route at any one time. The building counts for as much as the contents. Monday and Wednesday–Friday 10:00–18:00; Saturday 10:00–21:00; Sunday 10:00–18:00; Tuesday closed. Last entry is 30 minutes before closing. Also closed on 1 January, Easter Sunday, 1 May, and 24–25 December.

The permanent galleries are arranged as two independent circuits rather than one long corridor. The second circuit is European and runs chronologically. It opens with ivories and medieval illuminated manuscripts, takes in paintings by Rubens and Rembrandt, then Renaissance tapestries, Italian velvets and a sculpture by Andrea della Robbia, then eighteenth-century French furniture, gold and silverwork, painting and sculpture, then Francesco Guardi's Venice, English portraiture, and Turner, Manet, Degas, Renoir and Monet. The Lalique room closes the sequence. Last entry is 30 minutes before closing. Also closed on 1 January, Easter Sunday, 1 May, and 24–25 December.

Allow two hours. The Museum publishes no suggested visit length of its own, so that figure is this guide's judgement rather than a number read off its site, and it is built on what the Museum does publish. About a thousand works sit on a route split across two circuits, and the Museum's own highlights tour, The best of Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, is scheduled from 11:00 to 12:00 — an hour spent on a curated handful and nothing else. General Museum admission is €16 and includes the CAM Collection. Admission is free on Sundays from 14:00 and for visitors under 18.

The Museum opens 10:00 to 18:00 and is closed on Tuesdays. Saturday is the exception and the best day in the week: the galleries stay open until 21:00. Last entry is thirty minutes before closing every day, which makes the real cut-off 17:30 on a normal day and 20:30 on a Saturday. Monday and Wednesday–Friday 10:00–18:00; Saturday 10:00–21:00; Sunday 10:00–18:00; Tuesday closed. The museum is at Avenida de Berna 45A. Use São Sebastião Metro station on the Blue and Red lines; buses 716, 718, 726, 742, 746 and 756 also serve the Foundation.

A Museum ticket is 16 euros and includes admission to the CAM Collection at the Centro de Arte Moderna in the same grounds. The All Inclusive ticket at 18 euros covers the Museum and the CAM together, so two euros more buys everything the CAM shows, its temporary exhibitions included. General Museum admission is €16 and includes the CAM Collection. Admission is free on Sundays from 14:00 and for visitors under 18. Foundation visitor areas have access and equipment for people with limited mobility. Accessible public toilets are available. Stairlifts and wheelchair lifts can be used with assistance from security staff.

The address is Avenida de Berna 45A, 1067-001 Lisbon, inside the Foundation's campus between São Sebastião and Praça de Espanha. No car is needed, and in this part of Lisbon one is a liability. Entrecampos station, which connects to the metro network, is about a fifteen-minute walk. The museum is at Avenida de Berna 45A. Use São Sebastião Metro station on the Blue and Red lines; buses 716, 718, 726, 742, 746 and 756 also serve the Foundation. Accessible public toilets are available. Stairlifts and wheelchair lifts can be used with assistance from security staff.

The Tuesday closure is the trap that ruins the most days, and it applies to the Museum, its ticket office, its shop and its cafeteria alike, as well as to the Centro de Arte Moderna across the grounds. Only the garden stays open, free, from sunrise to sunset. Last entry thirty minutes before closing is the second trap. Two smaller notes. Foundation visitor areas have access and equipment for people with limited mobility. Stairlifts and wheelchair lifts can be used with assistance from security staff. Accessible parking spaces are located near the car-park lifts.

The Museum does not publish a photography policy on its website, so the honest position is that the rule here is whatever the room signage and the gallery staff say, and it is worth asking at the desk rather than assuming. Nothing below depends on the answer. What is worth knowing in advance is the light. The building was designed around two interior gardens and the galleries open onto them through tall windows. Saturday evening is the slot. Accessible parking spaces are located near the car-park lifts. Reception staff can provide accessibility assistance.