This is the place to see some of Vietnam’s best art, writes Asia Explorers. This includes oil paintings and sculptures along with Vietnamese ceramics and lacquerware, a combination of traditional Chinese art, modern art, Belle Époque and Soviet propaganda art and works of art from Vietnam's ancient civilizations. The museum offers “an extensive insight into Vietnamese aesthetics ranging from the country's earliest civilisations to the present day,” says Traveller.
The building was once owned by a businessman “affectionately known as Uncle Hoa,” explains the Guggenheim. In the late nineteenth century Hoa was “renowned for his wealth as one of the four richest men in Vietnam, and for his contributions to the development of important buildings and properties not only in Saigon, France’s ‘Pearl of the Orient,’ but also throughout the colonial federation of Indochine.” He became Saigon’s “king of real estate” and his business bloomed in the early 20th century, writes Saigoneer. “It's said that his assets reached the value of 20,000 houses (basically, he was very rich).”
Oh, and remember, the museum is not air-conditioned. “The heat can be stifling,” so go early in the day, recommends Travelfish, and also note that “there is no working lift.”