17 must-visit cultural spots in Montréal with Passeport MTL
Museums Culture, arts and heritage Museums and Culture The city Tours and cruises
For curious explorers eager to put their finger directly onto Montréal’s vibrant cultural pulse, Passeport MTL is essential. It opens the door to many of the city’s most captivating experiences, from world-famous museums to cutting-edge cultural spaces. Rub shoulders with locals as you dive into curated displays of science, history, art, and technology—it’s the ultimate companion for anyone ready to experience the city’s unique charm in a whole new way.
It's the ultimate companion for anyone ready to experience the city’s unique charm in a whole new way.
MEM - Centre des mémoires montréalaises
The MEM – Centre des mémoires montréalaises breathes life into Montréal’s history through its storytelling. Covering the people who live here and the narratives that shape the city’s identity like immigrant stories and long-time local traditions, its immersive exhibitions, community-led programs, and unique blend of public and private spaces form a collective living memory. The MEM invites everyone—whether native or newcomer—to contribute to the ongoing story of “Montreality.”
1210 Saint-Laurent Blvd.
![Society for Arts and Technology [SAT]](https://api.mtl.org/files/default/styles/square_600_600/public/2024-12/Capture%2520d-cran%25202019-07-02%2520-%252011.54.32.png.webp?itok=CGJtrPrD)
Société des arts technologiques [SAT]
The Society for Arts and Technology (SAT) has been a cornerstone of Montréal’s digital culture since 1996. Spread across 44,000 square feet, this cultural hub houses the groundbreaking Satosphere dome—a spherical theatre designed for immersive audiovisual experiences—alongside a research lab, artist residencies, and spaces for education and experimentation. Its industrial-chic venues host concerts, festivals, exhibitions, and more, making it a dynamic playground for artists and audiences alike.
1201 Saint-Laurent Blvd.
OASIS immersion
Offering a redefinition of escapism with its own combination of light, sound, and storytelling, OASIS Immersion is a contactless multimedia experience sprawls across three immersive galleries, two dynamic light installations, and a café-lounge with a curated shop. Powered by 105 laser projectors and 119 surround sound speakers, the space weaves together motion, colour, and emotion to create what it calls an “immersive magazine” akin to a playground intended to inspire with an uplifting lens.
Montréal Convention Centre (Access via Saint-Antoine Street)
TOHU
TOHU is Montréal’s epicentre for circus arts, featuring North America’s first circular performance hall in the form of a 360-degree stage designed for immersive experiences. Found in the Saint-Michel district, this venue blends art forms to create daring circus productions and the annual MONTRÉAL COMPLÈTEMENT CiRQUE festival which draws global audiences. Beyond performances, it’s a cultural hub that offers exhibitions, environmental events, and community-driven activities.
2345 Jarry Street East
Biosphère – Espace pour la vie
Visiting Montréal’s Biosphère means stepping into a relic of Expo 67 as well as an environmental museum. Housed within a striking geodesic dome designed by Buckminster Fuller and Shoji Sadao in Parc Jean-Drapeau, it serves as a platform for dialogue between science, art, and society, offering exhibitions and events that tackle climate change, biodiversity, and sustainable living. By day, it’s an inspiring hub for eco-conscious learning; by night, the dome transforms into a luminous spectacle, its colours shifting with the seasons. It’s worth visiting for the views it offers alone, but the exhibits are all rare finds.
160 Tour-de-l'Isle Road (Île Sainte-Hélène)
MUMAQ - Musée des métiers d'art du Québec
Celebrating the enduring artistry of Quebec’s craft traditions, the Musée des Métiers d’Art du Québec bridges the past and present through the skill, creativity, and community they put on display. Situated in Saint-Laurent, the museum also offers an audio heritage tour alongside its permanent exhibitions that invites visitors to explore local history through a unique lens. Beyond exhibitions, MUMAQ serves as a hub for research, learning, and dialogue, fostering connections between craft communities and Quebec’s broader cultural fabric.
615 Sainte-Croix Avenue
McCord Stewart Museum
Centrally located in downtown Montréal, this museum is a celebration of the city’s history, people, and communities. Contemporary and immersive, their exhibitions are consistently intriguing, including anything from the fashion of the 1980’s and the work of famous cartoonists to presentations on eating locally.
690 Sherbrooke Street West
PHI Centre
With future-forward programming, this cultural centre in Old Montréal is on the leading edge of the experiential in the city. With a wealth of contemporary artists’ exhibitions and impactful digital experiences including VR and installations to blow your mind in a myriad of ways, few places can hold to a candle to its attractions.
315 Saint-Paul Street West
Château Dufresne
Overseen by the Société du Château Dufresne, this museum set inside a heritage Beaux-Arts structure dating back over a century offers tours of a preserved past from the building’s original owners, the early 20th-century business moguls Oscar and Marius Dufresne, as well as art collections. Wandering through the storied interiors here, and you’ll hear all kinds of stories about bygone eras and artistic evolutions.
2929 Avenue Jeanne-d'Arc
Maison Saint-Gabriel
Located in former farm house dating back to when Marguerite Bourgeoys purchased it in 1668, this museum and historic site is an architectural storyteller for Québecois culture in Montréal. It’s as educational as it is historical, with everything you’ll ever need to know about the province’s rich rural heritage, and to understand how people here once lived.
2146 Place Dublin
Écomusée du fier monde
A history museum created for and operating on the basis of grassroots involvement, exhibits here tell the stories of the working class’ lives throughout industrialization and beyond, from post-war to how Montrealers’ identities grew into the later half of the 20th century. Founded in 1980, it’s an accomplished example of a cultural institution that looks on its city with a socio-cultural lens.
2050 Atateken Street
Montreal Holocaust Museum
As Montréal’s most accomplished institution for Holocaust education and communicating the universal perils of antisemitism, racism, hate and indifference, every visit here is a humbling, provocative and inspiring experience. Survivor testimonies, preserved and collected oral and written histories, and more are all available here as it continues to innovate with its collections.
5151 Chemin de la Côte-Sainte-Catherine
Musée des hospitalières de l'Hôtel-Dieu de Montréal
Composed of a monastery, a hospital, a garden, a crypt and three chapels, the exhibitions at this museum explore subjects such as hospital heritage, explorations of the city’s centerpiece of Mount Royal, healthcare throughout history, and more. Coming here is educational in and of itself, as its organizational roots date back as early as 1642.
201 Pine Avenue West
Château Ramezay
Situated inside a historical monument in Old Montréal, this museum has been operating since 1895, having been a history museum, national portrait gallery and public library open to the public in the following year. Today, their educational and cultural activities are aimed at introducing people Québecois culture, heritage, and daily life over the centuries—plus a unique example of urban garden one would find in New France.
280 Notre-Dame Street East
Pointe-à-Callière
A museum with a primary focus on the first Montrealers who founded the city in 1642, it has grown into a substantial cultural complex over the years that’s equal parts local and world history. Explore its archaeological crypt, learn about what makes Montréal so unique in terms of culture, architecture and art, and enjoy any one of its three to four temporary exhibits that it hosts every year.
350 Place Royale
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
Founded in 1860, this preeminent art museum is the oldest in the country and has led the pack in cultural offerings with its mix of Quebec and Canadian heritage alongside international artists from every time in history and corner of the globe. Today, it hosts thousands of works of art and has grown to include up to five different pavilions—each with their own atmosphere.
1380 Sherbrooke Street West
Guidatour
A leading organization for tours of Montréal and its surroundings, Guidatour has been operating since 1985 and has grown to include more than 100 certified guides offering services in more than 15 languages. From local tours on foot and spooky ghost experiences to bus tours and scavenger hunts, the options to experience the city with the organization are as widely varied as the subject matter they cover.
360 Saint-Francois-Xavier Street
Intrigued? More than interested?
All you need to do to get your own Passeport MTL and dive into the experience:
JP Karwacki
JP Karwacki is a Montréal-based writer and journalist whose work has appeared in Time Magazine, the Montreal Gazette, National Post, Time Out, NUVO Magazine, and more. Having called the city home for over a decade and a half, he regularly focuses on spreading the good word about the amazing things to eat, drink and do in Montréal. One half raconteur and the other flâneur (with just a dash of boulevardier), when he wasn’t working on the frontlines of the city's restaurants and bars, he spent his time thinking about, reading about and writing about restaurants and bars.