Barts Hospital in Smithfield has two museums, one which is open to the public most days, and another hidden away which is rarely open the public.
Except for this weekend – when Bart’s Pathology Museum, a Victorian delight of jars and dead things hosts a village fete filled with cupcakes and sweet delights.
Except, these are cupcakes decorated with the more gruesome of decorations inspired by the jars of medical curiosities which line the walls of the museum.
From tiny cakes decorated with furry tongues to signify a particular ailment to entire models of human organs in various stages of illness, this is a feast for the eyes, the mind, and if so tempted, the stomach.
The cup cakes are affordable, the larger specimens less so – although I suspect they would make for good birthday cakes for a student doctor.
However, this is not just a chance to admire cake decorating skills, but also to see inside this rare museum. Only the ground floor as the upper two levels have more recent human specimens, and access is more tightly controlled by the Human Tissue Authority. If you like the Huntarian Museum, you’ll love this place.
Oh, and do pick up a cake or two on the way out.
Eat Your Heart Out is open on Saturday and Sunday 11am-7pm each day and entry is free (although you might have to wait if there is a queue).
The easiest way to find it in the maze that is Barts Hospital is to go on via the King Henry VIII Gate (map link) and once into the main courtyard turn right and shortly ahead of you is the Robin Brook Centre, and a sign pointing to the Pathology Museum.
