The highly anticipated Prix Versailles released its 2026 list of the "World's Most Beautiful Museums", with Xuelei Fragrance Museum in Baiyun district of Guangzhou included on the list.

The award, established in 2015 by UNESCO and the International Union of Architects, is a major global architecture and design prize that highlights the country's advances in contemporary design.

An exterior view of Xuelei Fragrance Museum. [Photo/VCG]

This marks another milestone for the Xuelei Fragrance Museum, which previously earned a Guinness World Record for being the "largest fragrance museum" and now garners further international attention in architecture and design.

The museum, characterized by its red brick cylindrical structures, draws inspiration from the distillers used in modern perfume-making. Architectural media outlet ArchDaily praised the museum for using "scent", an invisible and intangible medium, as a starting point for spatial storytelling, integrating olfactory experiences with memory and multi-sensory design.

A diverse collection of perfumes is on display at the museum. [Photo/VCG]

Within its 9,500 square meters of experiential space, the museum features 18 themed exhibition areas, over 50 interactive installations and more than 300 scent points. Visitors can explore scents from ancient Egyptian rituals and oriental fragrances to the evolution of the modern perfume industry.

Since its opening, it has welcomed over 47,000 visitors.

A large perfume installation is set beside the spiral staircase. [Photo/VCG]