Milwaukee travel guide

Top 10 sights in Milwaukee

Ranked by Wikipedia language editions — proven fame.

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   1© Michael Hicks (Mulad) · CC BY 2.0

   Milwaukee Art Museum

   An art museum in Milwaukee holding nearly 35,000 works, whose 2001 Quadracci Pavilion by Santiago Calatrava has a movable brise-soleil of seventy-two steel fins that opens and closes twice a day. Its Georgia O'Keeffe and German Expressionist holdings are the strongest parts.

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2. 

   2© Paul Sableman · CC BY 2.0

   Basilica of St. Josaphat

   A basilica of 1901 in Lincoln Village built by Polish immigrant parishioners who bought a demolished Chicago post office and hauled its stone and columns here on five hundred rail cars. Its dome follows St Peter's in Rome and it was the third basilica designated in the United States.

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3. 

   3© User Sulfur on en.wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

   St. Joan of Arc Chapel

   A fifteenth-century French village chapel dismantled in the 1920s, shipped to America and re-erected on the Marquette University campus in 1966. It is claimed to be the only medieval European building in the western hemisphere still used for its original purpose.

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4. 

   4© Awkwafaba · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Milwaukee County Zoo

   A 77-hectare zoo run by Milwaukee County, opened in 1892, which pioneered predator-prey exhibits — placing lions and zebras in facing enclosures with a hidden moat so that both appear in one view. About 1,800 animals are kept.

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   5© The original uploader was Freekee at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church

   A Greek Orthodox church at Wauwatosa designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1956 and completed in 1961 after his death, one of his last works. A shallow blue dome sits on a circular plan with a Greek cross geometry; it is on the National Register.

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6. 

   6© The original uploader was Sulfur at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist

   The Catholic cathedral of the Milwaukee archdiocese, built in 1853, gutted by fire in 1935 and rebuilt, then reordered in 2002 in a renovation that provoked considerable local argument. Its 1893 bell tower survives.

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7. 

   7© Sulfur (Talk / contribs) · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Mitchell Park Horticultural Conservatory

   A conservatory of 1959-67 in Mitchell Park, of three glazed beehive domes twenty-seven metres high — tropical, arid and a show dome — which give it the local name The Domes. Its structural condition has put its future repeatedly in doubt.

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8. 

   8© The original uploader was Sulfur at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Nature & Culture Museum of Wisconsin

   A natural and human history museum founded in 1882 in downtown Milwaukee, credited with inventing the walk-through habitat diorama in 1890. The Streets of Old Milwaukee and the rainforest are its best-loved galleries; a new building is under construction.

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9. 

   9© The original uploader was Sulfur at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Tripoli Shrine Temple

   A Shriners temple built between 1926 and 1928 in the Concordia district, modelled on the Taj Mahal, with a white dome and minarets rising out of a residential street. Its dome is covered in about 30,000 glazed tiles.

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10. 

    10© Buster8079 · CC BY-SA 3.0

    WITI TV Tower

    A 329-metre lattice mast at Shorewood carrying television and radio for the Milwaukee area, built in 1962, and the tallest structure in Wisconsin.

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1. 

   1© Dori · CC BY-SA 3.0 us

   Harley-Davidson Museum

   A museum opened in 2008 to Harley-Davidson, founded in a Milwaukee shed in 1903, holding about 450 motorcycles including Serial Number One, the oldest known Harley. The archive of the company's own records is open to researchers.

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   SS Milwaukee

   A railway car ferry that sank in a Lake Michigan storm off Milwaukee in October 1929 with all fifty-two men aboard, after water came in through the stern car doors. Her wreck lies upright in 37 metres of water.

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   3© The original uploader was Sulfur at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   St. Stanislaus Catholic Church

   A Catholic church of 1872 in the Mitchell Street district, and the first large Polish church built in the United States, whose gilded twin spires mark the old Polish south side. It is now an oratory of the Institute of Christ the King.

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4. 

   4© SCUMATT at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Gesu Church

   A French Gothic Jesuit church of 1894 beside Marquette University, whose twin spires of ninety metres serve as the university parish. It is on the National Register and was made a Milwaukee landmark in 1975.

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5. 

   5© Dori · CC BY-SA 3.0 us

   Discovery World

   A science and technology museum on the Lake Michigan shore, opened in 2006, which takes no public funding. Its Great Lakes freshwater aquarium and the sailing school ship Denis Sullivan, a replica Great Lakes schooner, are the distinguishing parts.

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   6© The original uploader was Sulfur at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church

   A Victorian Gothic Lutheran church of 1878 built by German immigrants and once called the finest church in the Missouri Synod. Fire gutted it in 2018 and it was rebuilt and rededicated in 2024.

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   7© The original uploader was Freekee at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   North Point Water Tower

   A Victorian Gothic water tower of 1873-74 on the lake bluff, part of Milwaukee's first public waterworks, whose 53-metre limestone shaft housed a standpipe to even out the pumping pressure. It has been decorative since 1963.

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8. 

   8© https://www.flickr.com/people/jhtaylor/ · CC BY 2.0

   Lake Park

   A 56-hectare park on the bluff above Lake Michigan, designed in the 1890s by Frederick Law Olmsted, with ravine bridges and a lion staircase. The North Point Lighthouse of 1888 stands inside it.

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9. 

   9© Buster8079 · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Washington Park

   A park laid out from 1891 to an Olmsted plan on the west side, which held the county zoo from 1892 to 1958. Its lagoon and bandshell still serve summer concerts.

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    Boerner Botanical Gardens

    A botanical garden in Whitnall Park at Hales Corners, built in the 1930s as a Works Progress Administration project. Its formal rose garden and the daylily collection are the specialities, and the trial gardens test new cultivars.

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