The Russell-Cotes is one of the strangest and most enjoyable museums in southern England: a clifftop villa above the bay, built around 1900 in an extravagant blend of Italianate, Moorish, and Scottish baronial styles, and crammed with the eclectic collection assembled by the Russell-Cotes family on their world tours. It opened to the public in 1922 and has been preserved largely as the family left it.
The high points are the Main Hall with its painted ceiling and stained glass, the Mikado's Room with its lacquerwork screens, and the gallery of academic and Pre-Raphaelite paintings -- including some startling pieces by Edwin Long and a small Rossetti. The view back across the bay from the gardens is one of the best in the town. Open daily; modest admission charge.