Random Rambler

The Museum of Illusions is a fun museum located in the Gateway in downtown Salt Lake City. It features a bunch of interactive exhibits that illustrate optical illusions and perspective trickery. It was actually pretty neat, and I am glad we decided to explore it.

After a day full of adventures, and a yummy dinner, my good friend decided we still needed another adventure for the day. After a few false leads, we eventually found this. So we both went in completely blind as to what to expect.

Guest Photographer: I took pictures of the exhibits, Miss Elise took the fun shots of us (plus a few that employees took with her phone). Her images will be a little smaller, and will have blue text.

Quick Details:

Length: As much exploring as you’d like. I would guess the main path is less than a half mile.
Trail Type: A guided meander.
Difficulty: DR2. Indoors, flat.
Elevation Gain: NA
Restroom: Oddly placed, but yes. It is about halfway through.
Dogs? No.
Other Info: Fee area. Starting at $28.68 per person.

To Get Here:

Take i15 N to 600 N Head east to 400 W. Take that about 1.2 miles to 100 South. Find parking (there are a couple underground parking areas).

It is approximately in the middle. Just south of 100 South.

The fountain/splash pad thingy in the Olympic Legacy Plaza.

Walking through the Gateway Mall. They are starting to decorate for the holidays.

Neat skybridge.

Fun angel wings mural.

The Adventure:

So, quick note. We found out the restrooms are about halfway through as we both needed to use them. One of the employees said if it was an emergency she could take us through going the reverse route. But then we would have to go backwards to the beginning, and then back through again. So.. this is not in 100% the correct order. Sorry about that.

Infinite dodecahedron.

Right outside the restroom.. so now we will work our way backwards to the front.

I forget what this one was called.

It looks cooler from the outside with a friend taking your pictures. Thanks Elise!

I recommend coming as a group of at least 3, I don’t think any of them required more than that. 2 will get by though. We only had 1 illusion we felt the need to ask someone to take our picture.

I don’t know why I subjected myself to this. They always make me feel like I am going to fall over. I wish I had taken more pictures of the signs, not only for the name of the illusion, but they also had an explanation for how it works too.

The infinity room.

Again.

I believe this is a type of Anamorphosis. Again, I wish I had thought to take a picture of the sign. Anyway, we saw some of these at The Leonardo.

Come closer.

This one was fun. Very M.C Escher-esque

If I had thought about it I would have tried to reproduce a couple David Bowie poses.

This one, one of the nice employee’s helped us get a few shots of us as a mashup haha. I’m not sure if an employee always lingers around here for this, or if we just got lucky. But if not, this would be another one you need a 3rd party for.

This one is kind of trippy.

Head on a platter.

Again.

With me.

We both could have tried a little harder to line up the illusion better, but meh. It’s still neat.

Fish hologram.

2 heads are better than 1.

Tilted room.

I didn’t quite get this one.

I have seen this illusion online before, but it is neat to see it in real life. The back of the hallways, are actually closer to me than the 'front'. Use the shadows below to confirm it.

The same sculpture from 2 different angles.

Yay! This is fun.

Hanging off the window.

My friend.

Hindsight being 2020 I have a couple more fun ideas we could have done here.

Resetting the giant pin thingy.

To recreate the Han Solo in Carbonite thingy.

Me on 2 sides of the same room. I got so small!

This is in the Ames Room.

Getting bigger.

Eyes that follow you. I wanna say, this is like, one of the oldest illusions ever.

It is also at the beginning. So, now we are going to go through the museum like normal. We mostly ignored what we already explored, but I may have taken a few extra shots.

Another fun perspective illusion.

We had to ask for help from another patron to get a shot, but, we both loved it. It looks like if I had taken 2 steps forward it would have been a little better, but meh.

Freaky.

Random fun illusions.

These are cool, but I think the video shows it much much better.

Quick videos.

The infinity Portal. Looking down made me a little queasy.

Looking up.

Infinity mirror. We saw something very similar to this at the Museum of Pop Culture in Seattle.

All 4 of those images were from the same vantage. It changed based on the color of light shining on it at the time.

The other corner.

Poker table with alternate versions of you.

Playing poker with my 5 other personalities. Better taken from a friend.

This one reminds me of the meme…

Snort.

Concave mirror.

Another.

This one wigged me out for a hot minute.

Pyramids.

Cubes (reminds me of the Borg).

Transition. Neat.

Giant kaleidoscope.

With me.

Inside.

Jane Austen.

Books from the other side.

I have implemented the use of this kind of illusion a few times in my life. Pro-tip: It is a great way to remind you of 2 different events. Such as if the dishes in the dishwasher are clean or dirty.

Tesla Coil.

Nikola Tesla from the other side.

I didn’t take a picture but there is a room full of interactive games to play with, and thankfully a sanitizer station near the exit.

No matter how you turn it, the arrow always points left. Fun.

This was super trippy. Watching my head spin around, but from the other way. o.O

Seemingly different colors match when aligned.

The final display. Another employee came around and helped us get some neat shots.

I must say, I am very pleased with our final shot.

Neat fountain. They had to add a sign to say “Drink with your eyes only” I can’t imagine ever thinking this is a place to grab a drink.

Then of course the exit was through the giftshop. Neither of us found anything we couldn’t live without.

Back out in the Gateway Mall.

Fun lighted sign.

Fun rainbow lighted tree.

We decided to stop by a bar for a beer.

Fun quote on the stairs.

The sky bridge again. It currently appears to lead to a private area.

From the side.

Under the gateway sign.

Looking up 100 South. You can see SLC’s newest tallest building, The Astra Tower. It is showing purple for our air quality today. Purple is bad.

Then it switched to red. Which is also bad. So, yeah, our air is not so good right now.

The Gateway sign again.

Another.

After our beer, we decided we had a good night, and it was time to head back home. Particularly because there was a Jazz game tonight, and we were hoping to beat that traffic.

Heading back to the car.

It’s like.. 9ish on a Tuesday, and the mall is pretty empty. I mean, it is Utah, but still. I guess the mall was on the brink of collapse before changing the standard mall concept from the 90’s. As far as I know it is now thriving though.

They have sold quite a bit of space as office space.

Little mural.

Fun rainbow mural.

More decorated trees.

Uh oh! I see a lot of movement at the Delta Center. We need to get our butts in gear if we want to beat the crowd.

The Gateway Sign again (PSP).

We got stuck in the beginning of the sportsball traffic, but it wasn’t too bad at all. It took us maybe 5 minutes to get to the freeway. I have definitely experienced much worse, even recently.

Aside from the random small traffic jam, that was pretty neat! I am glad my friend found it for us to explore. There is another nearby experience room that I confused with his that I have been wanting to explore, but hey, next time. This was really neat though! mmmm… 8 out of 10 squirrels. It was a little pricey for what they offered. But, the employees really went out of their way to make it a neat experience.