New Orleans Pharmacy Museum

This is a wonderful slice of New Orleans history. But more than that, it's a peek into how science and culture shift over time yet so much stays the same. Huge shout out for our tour guide, Grace! she made it come alive, sparked interaction between herself, the exhibits and the crowd. Highly recommended for all, but specifically for science and medicine aficionados!

Once you have finished a great meal at Napoleon House, take a small stroll down the street to the ever filled house of Louis J. Dulfilho, Jr, the first licenses pharmacist in the United States.

This musuem is 3 stories high, granted the 3rd story is inaccessible to the public, and found out the weird, insane, crazy, and what feels like out of this world information on how pharmacies and medical health has changed and evolved over the years.

The tickets are $10/person for the unguided tour and $20/person for the guided tour. While my wife and I did the unguided tour, I would come back to do the guided tour as the tour guides will have more information then I can process or read.

After looking around, don't forget to go to the court yard to see where they grew the herbs and plants for the pharmacy.

A coworker invited me to go to a "Pharmacy Museum Tour" with her and because I had nothing planned during my day off, I went. Why is this so cool? Our hosted tour guide, Grace, was fantastic and presented medical devices, voodoo medicine, and antiquated medicine and history in a part actress/part historian way I had no idea I wanted and loved.

The museum itself is small and you could probably walk through in about an hour and a half, but the highlight is definitely the extremely affordable, one hour, guided tour and walkthrough. The guide told us the history of how pharmacies came to be, the strange relationship between soda fountains, "little back rooms", slavery, and "homeopathic" pharmacies - I never knew I wanted to know this lol.

Not just a pharmacy tour, but a history of the deep south, a collection of medical devices, and voodoo potions. 6 stars if I could!

What an interesting pit-stop.
Self guided tours are about $10 - they had guided tours too but they were booked up for the weekend.
The museum is on two levels in a two rooms. There's so much to see and learn about in those rooms and they give you a guide sheet as well. I started out of order on the second floor since the first room on the first floor was really crowded and worked my way back.
There was an interesting exhibit about black pharmacists as well that I enjoyed reading about the rich and proud history of in New Orleans.
Well worth the 10 dollars to see artifacts when leeches, cocaine and heroin were used for all kinds of ailments.

The New Orleans Pharmacy Museum is unlike anything I've ever seen before. it was $10 a ticket when I went and completely completely self-guided. The woman in the front was very nice and we were able to purchase our tickets incredibly quickly and get all the info we needed.

The tour, being completely self-guided, can get a little long. It didn't get too crowded, but you definitely have to stop and read the very interesting information that's offered to you. The downstairs was crazy enough as it is, but when you head upstairs things get even more wild.

It's just so interesting to see how far medicine has come. don't get me wrong, the self guided aspect of the museum can get a little tedious but overall it's incredibly interesting. Definitely fits in with the spooky New Orleans vibe. I'd say check it out when you're here. It's an hour or two well spent and I'll guarantee you're gonna learn a few things.

I did the self-paced tour. I liked seeing all the potions and medicines from the olden years as well as the old cash register and soda fountain. I'm an L and D RN so I really enjoyed all the midwifery/OB equipment and history, and I was surprised to see it here.

This place is SO COOL, but I'm a hospital nurse. I did the guided tour, which requires a reservation on their website and costs $15 for 45 minutes. The guided tour is available on certain days and starts at 10:00am before the museum opens to the public. No food or drinks allowed. Otherwise, admission is $10. There was a big crowd for the guided tour. Photography is OK. I believe my tour guide was Grace. She was very knowledgeable and funny, maybe sarcastic, but in a good way. Her tour was focused on the items on the first floor of the museum and the courtyard. There is an exhibit on the second floor, which is more medical, but she doesn't cover that. There is a small gift shop.

Overall, I am glad that I did this. I recommend this to anyone interested to visit.

Pro tip: have your QR code ready when you check in for your guided tour and definitely tip your tour guide!

If you're in the medical field or interested in that stuff at all, this is worth your time. The tour itself isn't too long, maybe 45 mins. You get to see inside an old 3 story townhouse stocked with old medicines and medical equipment. You hear about the history of the pharmacists who lived/worked in the townhome. Very unique compared to the many tours offered in New Orleans. Remember to bring some cash to tip your tourguide! There's an ATM a block down from the museum.

This is a very cool, hole in the wall (literally) museum for anyone who loves morbid or interesting things! You take a self-guided tour with a paper containing explanations for all the tools, jars of items, and old timey things you see that cover the walls and tables in the museum. There is an upstairs with more exhibits as well. The museum itself is small, but there is a small outside part that is very pretty. This was a great way to spend an hour learning about the pharmacies and medicine in historic times. The exhibits were jam packed and you could spend hours in there looking at each and every freaky item! Because it is self guided it can get cramped and you can feel rushed at times. Overall I would recommend this as something cool to see!

The New Orleans Pharmacy Museum is a little macabre, very interesting, and a LOT of fun if you go with friends who you can discuss all the exhibits with!

The layout of the museum is a little "scattered" feeling, with heaps of different items all over the place. But if you pay attention, items actually are organized by type (an eyeglass exhibit, the wall of old-timey medical ingredients, etc.

There is a big courtyard in the back that is absolutely beautiful, a display of an old bedroom showing how medical visits were done in the past (including bed pans!), as well as an old "pharmacy" soda shop stand, how it would have looked in those days.

Almost every single piece in the museum has a placard with information about it, so you know what you're looking at.

With two floors of exhibits, it can eat up an entire day if you really dive into everything really thoroughly!