Best Science Museum Gift Shops For Anatomy Nerds

Did you know that we have our guts spread out worldwide? It’s true! We’re in brick-and-mortar stores in nine different countries and online. We love every vendor we can put our guts in, so we’re showing our love to a few of them here.

First up on our list is the Houston Museum of Natural Science. Prepare to get your science socks knocked off at HMNS, the city’s largest science museum. Transport across the sands of the Sahara, stroll through the Butterfly Center, or, our personal favorite, explore the human body's inner workings at the BODY WORLDS & The Cycle of Life exhibition.

Check out more than 100 preserved human specimens, whole-body plastinates and individual organs and organ configurations. These are no plushie organs – they’re the real thing! I Heart Guts is stoked to have a special shoutout in the exhibit: Sold-out Super Big Big Heart! Our heart grows extra large just thinking about it.

Museums are great, but we all know the gift shop is where all the fun is. After you take a look under the skin, hit the museum store for souvenirs with heart and guts.

Are you into penises and legs in jars? Then the freaky deeky Mütter Museum at the College of Physicians in Philadelphia is for you. This medical history museum showcases the mysteries and beauty of the human body, so of course we’re fans of it. You’ll leave here disturbingly informed about the history of diagnosis and treatment of disease.

Also, we’ll let you in on a mega secret: We made a special Megacolon Plushie for their gift store! Yup, this exclusive plush made in collaboration with the museum is only available at the Mütter Museum Shop and their online store.

Next up on our tour of the best museum gift shops is the Science Museum of Minnesota. 

We’re partial to the Human Body Gallery exhibit, where you can do sickeningly cool stuff like measure how much blood is in your body and analyze real and preserved organs and bodies like a scientist.

Between the exhibits, experiences, and Omnitheater, it’s hard to imagine that the museum can get any better until you stop by the Explore Store. Proceeds from each purchase help the museum’s mission of making essential, engaging science learning available to everyone. So, when you shop the store’s selection of science-specific goodies—including a delightful array of I Heart Guts gifts—you support local!

If you’re a true guts and human body nerd, you need to put Science World at Telus in Vancouver on your bucket list. 

We’re all different, and the BodyWorks Gallery celebrates precisely that. Get an inside look at the full range of your guts at work, from the largest organ (your skin!) to microscopic chromosomes. See if you can guide a sperm safely to an egg, or watch what happens to food as it travels through your body.

Continue the excitement at home with a memento from the Science World Store. Their shop features a curated selection of the best unique educational gifts to spark scientific joy. Our very own heart plushie is a staff pick, which, according to Kate H. is ​​“exactly the kind of heart a science nerd will appreciate!” We’re blushing.

On days when it’s raining cats and dogs, spend an afternoon at the Museum of Surgical Science in Chicago, North America’s only museum devoted to surgery. For peeps with a passion for vintage torture devices, erm, we mean medical equipment, you’ll find exceptional medical apparatuses, instruments and artifacts here, like an amputation saw from the 16th century.

If ancient skulls aren’t your cup of tea, the IMSS also features fine art collections of paintings, prints, and sculptures, a library of rare books, and a Museum Store filled with medical and historical guts, featuring yours truly. 

After you’ve admired the Lindbergh perfusion pump that enabled doctors to keep organs functioning outside the body, take a peek at our plushie organs chilling outside of the body in the museum gift shop. 

We didn’t steer you wrong, did we? Our guts truly are spread out all over the place! You’ll likely find our guts nearby, ready to put a pep in your step no matter where you are. Show off your true, inner nerd by picking up a gut during your next museum visit, and check out our complete list of stores with guts.