Powerhouse Museum, Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences

The Powerhouse Museum is located in the Darling Harbour precinct which attracts over eight million visitors a year and was of primary focus in both the 2000 millennium celebrations and the Sydney 2000 Olympic games. The Powerhouse museum opened in 1988 and is positioned as a dynamic, innovative and enjoyable museum which promotes awareness and understanding of the past, present and future of Australian society.

The Powerhouse achieves this through research, scholarship and the acquisition, conservation and presentation of material in the fields of science, technology, industry, decorative arts, design and social history. The museum also initiates and tours exhibitions locally, statewide, nationally and internationally.

The Powerhouse Museum is the flagship site of the Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences which was first established as a collecting institution in 1880, following the Sydney International Exhibition of 1879. Since opening in 1988, the Powerhouse has emerged as one of Australia's leading cultural institutions, attracting around 600,000 visitors per year, including over 120,000 school students.

The audience for the Powerhouse Museum is spread across all age groups with a primary market being adults. A major market survey has shown that the visitor base has a broad demographic reach across Sydney and its suburbs and a significant proportion of intrastate and interstate visitors, inbound tourists, special interest and incentive based visitors.