Centrum Pieniadza NBP

What to Expect

The NBP Money Centre is one of the best free museums in Warsaw — and one of the most underrated. Located inside the headquarters of the National Bank of Poland on Swietokrzyska Street, it opened in 2016, spans over 2,000 square metres, and does something most museums struggle with: it makes economics genuinely engaging.

Sixteen themed rooms trace the history of money from antiquity to the present day. Over 10,000 exhibits and 240 multimedia stations — this is not a museum where you stand around reading labels. Here you walk into a vault with a gold bar worth over half a million dollars (try lifting it — it weighs 12.5 kg). You press buttons on a stock market simulator. You check whether a banknote is real. You sit inside an armoured cash transport vehicle.

Among the most valuable exhibits: the denar of Boleslaw Chrobry (Poland’s first coin), gold coins from around the world, and a collection of interwar Polish banknotes and currency. But it’s the interactivity that makes the difference: an ATM from the inside, the history of credit cards, an investment game. Children (and plenty of adults) can spend two hours here and still not want to leave.

The centre is named after Slawomir S. Skrzypek — the NBP president who died in the Smolensk air disaster in 2010. He conceived the idea for this place.

Tips

• Always free admission. No reservation needed for individual visitors — just show up. Organised groups book through the form on the website.
• The audio guide is available and worth using — it walks you through all 16 rooms in a logical sequence. Families with children get interactive maps.
• Thursdays open until 20:00 — the only day with extended hours. All other days close at 18:00.
• Allow at least 1.5 hours. You can rush through faster, but you’ll miss half the interactive stations.
• Perfect rainy-day option — free, interactive, in the city centre, right next to a metro station.
• Don’t confuse it with the Museum of the Bank of Poland (Bankowy 3/5) — that’s a different institution.

Getting There

Metro: Swietokrzyska station (M1 and M2 lines) — 5-minute walk. Ideal location at the interchange of both metro lines.

Bus: Lines 111, 116, 128, 175, 180 — Ordynacka stop, right next to the entrance.

Tram: Lines along Marszalkowska — Swietokrzyska and Centrum stops, 5-8 minute walk.

By car: Parking in the area is difficult — this is central Warsaw. The metro is a far better choice.

Nearby Museums

Background

The idea for the Money Centre was born in the mind of Slawomir Skrzypek, president of the National Bank of Poland, who envisioned “an educational and exhibition facility popularizing economic knowledge using the most modern multimedia techniques.” He never saw it realised — he died on April 10, 2010, in the Smolensk air disaster.

Conceptual work began in 2008. Over the following years, the team assembled exhibits, consulted with experts in economics, numismatics, and the history of money, and studied similar institutions around the world.

The ceremonial opening took place on April 20, 2016. The public first visited the exhibition during Museum Night on May 14, 2016. Since then, the Money Centre has become one of Warsaw’s most popular free museums — especially among families and school groups.