Dali Museum Date

Two weeks ago my boyfriend and I celebrated our 4 year anniversary.

We decided to do something that we have been wanting to do for quite a while- the Dali Museum.

One thing that made us want to do it NOW, and stop putting it off, is the temporary Picasso exhibit that was on display as well, showing their works side by side.

Living where I do in Florida gives me a lot of options for fun things to do, often educational or cultural as well. However living with the kind of budget that I have, it makes doing these things a bit more difficult.
The museum is $24 a person which is a little pricey since the average museum admission in the US is $8. They do have a price cut special if you go on Thursday evenings after 5 pm.

The Dali Museum has actually been in St Petersburg since 1982, but it wasn't until it moved to a new building in 2011 that it caught my eye. Once I show you the building itself I'm sure you can understand why!

(If you don't live in Florida, or you want to see a more comprehensive view, you can take a virtual tour here! Pretty cool.)

One really neat thing is that outside of the Dali Theater-Museum that Dali himself opened in Spain, this museum has the largest collection of his works. It has 7 of the 18 "masterwork" paintings.

First, since this IS primarily a beauty blog I thought I'd show you my makeup for the date. I wanted to wear something flirty and romantic, and this has been my go-to lately. In fact, I've been wearing this look so much that I have a post coming up dedicated to it! So all details will be in that post.

I told you the building was eye-catching! It has found itself on many architecture and must-see lists of Florida. It's so unique you can't stop looking at it!

Our 4 year celebration selfie

The museum was actually quite crowded, even though it was a Thursday morning. We got there about an hour after opening and it was really busy!

My main suggestion is to buy your tickets online in advance. This is suggested especially for weekends because they can't promise that there will be space to accommodate those without tickets. And if it got that crowded on a week day, I can only imagine how packed it gets during the weekend!

The perk for us was when we walked up to the entrance (which has a beautiful water feature that I regrettably didn't take any pictures of) there was a long line. But we were informed right away that if you already bought tickets, you could just head on inside to grab wrist bands. Those 20 or so people were giving us some dirty looks for waltzing past them!

There are tour guides and also audio guides, provided for free. We did not have that much time since my boyfriend had work in the afternoon, so we didn't participate in the guides but if we did it again I would definitely do the audio guide. 

Personally I wouldn't do a tour because with such a large group it's hard to get a good view of the artwork. We found ourselves waiting until the group had moved on to move in on a piece to get a good look at it up close.

It was nice to stroll through and really look at Dali's works especially before he got into the surrealist movement and found his niche. 

We took a picture of the above because it's called  Atmospheric Skull Sodomizing a Grand Piano  because we're 5 and even though we were trying to act mature and cultured it still made us giggle. Whoops.

The Hallucinogenic Toreador 

It was breathtaking to see some of Dali's masterworks, and they are huge! And so, so detailed. There is so much going on in them I wish we could have stared at them forever. However since it was so crowded and naturally everyone wanted a look at these pieces, we had to give other people a chance.

We snuck off to the "contemplation room" to rest our feet and have a break from the crowd. One wall of the room was just a huge window that looked out on the ocean so I took advantage of the lighting to take another picture of my makeup.

The Ecumenical Council

I enjoyed seeing which paintings my boyfriend was attracted to vs which ones caught my eyes

But I would be lying if I said I wasn't eagerly waiting to get to the Picasso exhibit.

Unfortunately there were no photos allowed in the Picasso exhibit. I will not comment about whether or not I followed that rule...

The Picasso exhibit was definitely the highlight for me. As interesting and talented as Dali is, there was something breathtaking about being next to Picasso's work. His pieces captivated me and even though the exhibit itself was kind of small, I could have stayed there a long time. 

Casually chillin' with Salvador and Pablo, you know. 

Finally, we headed outside into the garden which was one of my favorite things. 

A cool local thing here is called Clearwater's Dolphins (more info here!) which was an art project created in 2012. Different businesses sponsored a dolphin which was designed by local artists. These were once all together at Clearwater Beach but now they are all home at their corresponding businesses. We were delighted to see this Dali inspired dolphin in the garden.

There's a huge mustache that encourages you to post pictures with the hashtag #Dalistache

This lovely little place is somewhere I could have enjoyed for a long time. It's a little garden with a labyrinth in the back, a melting clock bench, a wish tree, and a temporary Picasso bench as well. 

This surreal bench is a fun way to interact with art!

The wish tree was beautiful. It was windy the day we went so the branches and strings of wishes were floating in the breeze. What people do is write their wishes on their museum wristband and then tie it to streamers that hang from the tree. 

It was very colorful, but also very stark white.

If you're wondering; my dress is a little old but it's from Target. It has shrunk a lot and is now too short to wear as a dress so I wear leggings underneath. These particular leggings I got from Walmart during black friday. As for my shoes, I only wore them since they were comfy enough to walk around in. It was a good choice. 

Of course I had to add my own wish. We didn't have a pen but I just visualized my wish ;) and tied it on.

Last but not least is the labyrinth.. We thought this was a maze but it's really just one winding path to the center. I thought there might be fun statues or art installments throughout it but it was rather straight forward and simple. Regardless, it was a bit whimsical and felt like we were getting lost all by ourselves so it was a bit romantic. 

The picture at the top of me with the building was taken from inside the labyrinth so it does provide some great views of the museum.

All in all, we had a great day. We could have stayed longer or gone back into the exhibits because we kind of rushed to make sure we had time for everything before we had to go. But I wish we had doubled back and soaked up some more art.

If you live in the area or will be visiting the Tampa Bay Area at some point, I highly recommend checking it out! It's a great date, too! 

Personally I urge you to go while the Picasso exhibit is still there. It just got extended until February 22nd. It may get extended after that (it has been extended already once or twice now) but to be safe, I would plan to go before then.

After the Picasso exhibit is gone I am sure other cool temporary exhibits will take it's place! 

I suggest giving yourself around 3-4 hours. We did it in less but like I said we were rushing and if I had known, I would have taken my time more.

Have you ever been to the Dali Museum? Do you like his artwork? Do you like the idea of going to an art museum on a date? Tell me!