The Ducal Museum was built at the foot of Friedenstein Castle between 1864 and 1879 in the elegant and pompous style of historicism. Both inside and out, the outstanding architecture has been largely preserved down to the last detail. Renovated in recent years thanks to funding from the Federal Republic of Germany, the Free State of Thuringia and the City of Gotha, the building was reopened in 2013. It now houses the unique Gotha art collections.

The collections emerged from the Gotha dukes' passion for collecting and today bring together Egyptian mummies, antique vases, sculptures and gold jewelry, cork models of ancient Roman buildings from the 18th century and art treasures from China and Japan. Among the highlights are certainly the Dutch and German paintings with works by Peter Paul Rubens, Jan van Goyen, Lucas Cranach the Elder and Caspar David Friedrich. Unique, however, is the world-famous "Gotha Lovers", a painting from the pre-Dürer period that is as mysterious as it is artistically outstanding. Sculptures by Conrad Meit and Adriaen de Vries, but above all the sculptures by Jean-Antoine Houdon, are also on display: Gotha is home to the world's largest collection of works by this sensitive French classicist sculptor outside France. Also noteworthy are the ceramic collections in Gotha, which include 16th century Italian majolica, Böttger stoneware and 18th century Meissen porcelain. In the colorful rooms, staged in a new light, a historical, diverse and high-quality collection is presented to the modern public and invites young and old to discover it.