M Shed

M Shed is a museum in Bristol, England, located on Prince's Wharf beside the Floating Harbour in a dockside transit shed formerly occupied by Bristol Industrial Museum. The museum's name is derived from the way that the port identified each of its sheds. M Shed is home to displays of 3,000 artefacts and stories, showing Bristol's role in the slave trade and items on transport, people, and the arts. Admission is free. The museum opened in June 2011, with exhibits exploring life and work in the city. In its first year, 700,000 people visited the new museum. Normally moored in front of the museum is a collection of historic vessels, which include a 1934 fireboat (the Fire-float Pyronaut), and two tugboats (Mayflower, the world's oldest surviving steam tug, and John King, a 1935 diesel tug) and the replica caravel The Matthew, the ship that crossed the Atlantic with John Cabot in 1497. The museum contains a shop, learning space and café.