National Space Centre Space": the anniversary of the first satellite, Sputnik. National Space Centre The National Space Centre is a museum and educational resource covering the fields of space science and astronomy, along with a space research programme in partnership with the University of Leicester. It is located on the north side the city of Leicester, England, next to the River Soar. Many of the exhibits, including upright rockets, are housed in a tower with minimal steel supports and a semi-transparent cladding of ETFE 'pillows' which has become one of Leicester's most recognisable landmarks. The building was designed by Nicholas Grimshaw, and it
National Space Centre Engineering Surveying and Space Geodesy (IESSG). The Centre has on display one of only three known Soyuz spacecraft in the West (there is one in France at the Cité de l'espace and another one in the United States at the Smithsonian Institution as part of their Apollo-Soyuz Test Project display). The centre has six main galleries of exhibits and visitor activities covering space flight, astronomy and cosmology. The attraction also includes a Digistar 3 dome cinema and planetarium, a gift shop and a restaurant. The restaurant is situated beneath the two nozzles of the Blue Streak and PGM-17 Thor rockets.