FASCINATING artefacts from around the world are to go on public display in Liverpool for the first time.
The 20,663 objects are housed inside the revamped Liverpool Museum, which has been re-named World Museum Liverpool following a £35m restoration lasting five years.
Many of the exhibits have never been seen before, or have been kept in storage for many decades as there was nowhere to put them on display.
This is the first time the Victorian building on William Brown Street has been fully re-opened since it was bombed in the 1941 blitz of Liverpool in the Second World War.
The extensive re-development has doubled the size of the museum, which first opened on Duke Street in 1853.
It features expanded galleries and new features such as the World Cultures gallery, the Bug House - where visitors will encounter giant model insects - and a new Aquarium which shows live fish and other creatures in their underwater habitat.
The project was made possible with a £32m grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, the largest ever awarded to a museum project.
Loyd Grossman, the new chairman of National Museums Liverpool, will officially open the new museum to the public on Friday. The ground-level entrance and central glass-topped atrium provides access to the museum galleries, cafe, shop and education facilities.
The entrance features a number of striking features, including a model of a giant flying reptile.
The World Cultures exhibition is housed in the former Upper Horseshoe Gallery, the first time it has opened to the public since the blitz of May 1941 destroyed the old museum.
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