Museum of Illusions, Instagrammable Edutainment, Opens Friday in Downtown Cleveland

In the realm of good downtown retail news, the stories are typically predictable. A flashy bar concept opens up on Euclid. A restaurant with a fire-pitted rooftop on Public Square. A casino extension for chainsmokers.

But things to do for families downtown? A little harder to come by.

It’s possible that the Museum of Illusions, the “edutainment” collection of brain teaser exhibits opening around the country, could help fill a downtown gap of attractions for more than just barhopping adults and event-goers. The museum, situated at 184 Euclid Avenue in the May Building on Public Square, will open to the public on Friday, May 31.

The museum’s debut comes nearly a decade after the space’s last tenant, the Cadillac Ranch restaurant, shut its doors in 2014, after six years in business. Most of the ground floor retail space facing Public Square have remained vacant, despite its massive $50 million makeover preceding the Republican National Convention eight years ago.

“The addition of the Museum of Illusions to Downtown will be fantastic,” Audrey Gerlach, vice president of economic development at Downtown Cleveland, Inc., told Scene in December. “It will create a nice connection between Euclid Avenue and Public Square, and offer a unique, year-round experience for people of all ages.

“This is exactly the type of experiential retail that brings people downtown,” she added, “and invites them to linger: I think it will thrive.”

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Mark Oprea

Krystal Casteneda, the museum’s general manager, sitting on Beuchet’s Chair, which can only be viewed as one from a specific perspective.

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Mark Oprea

Both museum staff and downtown boosters hope the spot can help respond to the growing need for all-ages attractions in Cleveland’s city center.

 Claiming to be the “largest and fastest-growing chain of privately-held museums in the world,” according to its website, the Museum of Illusions first opened in 2015 in Zagreb, Croatia, which sees, the company says, more than 300,000 visits per year.

Since then, the museum’s “edutainment” brand has sprouted to over 40 locations worldwide, with 15 currently in the U.S., including Las Vegas, Kansas City and Scottsdale. New locations, including Cleveland’s, will be opening in Seattle and San Diego later this year.

Filling about 9,000 square feet with a wraparound series of low-lit hallways and breakout rooms, the actual experience itself conjures both a kind of hilarity with eye trickery and, to the adult crowd, a sense of nostalgia. (Remember the “magic box” with the “floating” object? The 3D green laser etchings?)

In one mural, Nikola Tesla’s eyes follow viewers as they walk by. In another, museum goers can “sit” on Beuchet’s Chair, albeit from the right viewing angle. And in the Infinity Room, or the Kaleidoscope, viewers can see themselves in an endless series of mirrored triangles.

And for those that need to know who the scientist behind the Ames Room (a shifty sense of perspective) is, or who could easily (like this writer) develop nausea at mere sight of the revolving Vortex Tunnel, which is no joke, the museum has a staff of Illusion Experts wandering around to help.

The whole trip, as suggested by camera icons that dot the floor, is undeniably—and maybe a tad bit too suggested at times—ripe for social media.

“Sure, it’s very photo-friendly, and intentionally interactive,” Krystal Casteneda, the interim general manager of Cleveland’s museum, told Scene on a tour Thursday. She had just demonstrated the Swiping Bodies half-mirror exhibit. “But at the same time it’s also a place to learn, why we call it ‘edutainment.'”

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Mark Oprea

Daria Jelavić, a marketing manager for the Museum of Illusions, “sitting on” a mirrored reflection of the building’s facade.

But will families show up as predicted? Bespoke, niche concept museums not affiliated with any Cleveland institution are rare in the city center, which means the whole draw could ride nicely for a while on novelty. Moreover, the museum’s admission prices—$24 for adults, and $22 for kids—could be a little high for some.

It’s why, again, the museum’s draw rests, its employees say, in a fun-for-all vibe. (Think and Drink and yo-pro happy hour events are on the agenda.) Wonderment, the trickery of mirrors or upside-down basketball hoops or concaved masks, are definitely, staff believe, worth a stop.

“There’s a lasting value because kids love this,” Daria Jelavić, the museum’s head of marketing in Croatia, told Scene after “sitting on” a mirrored reflection of the museum’s facade. “I mean, they want to stay for five, six hours. I’ve seen some in Copenhagen scream when they have to leave: ‘I don’t want to go home!'”

Jelavić walked over to the inverted basketball hoop, in a small room dressed up lightly for, it seems, Cleveland sports fans. A photographer took the shot.

“Did you get a good one?” Casteneda said. She looked at the photo, at Jelavić underneath the backboard. “See? She’s upside down, right?”

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