The Puzzle Museum is a private collection-based museum. In the 1990s much time was spent trying to find suitable premises to open to the public but, unfortunately, we were not successful. Ironically, since that time various major collections have been given to the museum, including the incomparable Hordern Collection; however, owing to lack of appropriate facilities, it is not currently open to the general public and has to be held at various different locations. Visitors, mostly world experts in the field, can come by invitation, or recommendation only.
The collection is the finest of its type in the world. It is the product of over 110 years of collecting starting with the Rev. Henry Stanley Mercer in the 1880s in Australia. The major contributors over the last century have included Louis Bloncourt, T.H.O'Beirne, Eileen Scott, Edward Hornby, Mary Hillier, Edward Hordern and James Dalgety.
The collection includes a few items of great antiquity; however its main strengths are the 19th Century European collection, and its near comprehensive collection of puzzles from the last quarter of the 20th Century. It amounts to several tens of thousands of puzzles, plus ephemera and a related library. It is possibly 1,000 times larger than needed for a tourist based puzzle museum but is very appropriate as an international archive. It is extraordinary that, unlike such items as Dolls, Watches, Model Trains, or Toys, there is no good collection of Puzzles open to the public anywhere in the world. The Puzzle Museum has therefore given itself the following objectives: - ·
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