Jimi Hendrix Apartment Now Museum

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Jimi Hendrix apartment opens as a museum 45 years after his death - Jimi Hendrix' former apartment has been restored and open to the public more than 45 years after his death. The London flat was reportedly the rock legend's first “real home” of his own, according to a Reuters report posted by Yahoo News on Feb. 11.

Jimi Hendrix moved into the apartment at 23 Brook Street in July 1968 after his then-girlfriend Kathy Etchingham saw it advertised in a newspaper. A multi-million dollar renovation restored the space to make it look just like it did when the rocker lived there. Hendrix personally decorated his pad with bright curtains, cushions and wall hangings. The Atlantic Constitution Journal revealed that the apartment was recreated right down to the retro telephones and scallop shell ashtray on the bedside table. Etchingham told the Associated Press returning to the apartment was like “traveling in a time capsule back 45 years.”

Hendrix wrote music, rehearsed and gave press interviews at the apartment, which he lived in from July 1968 until March 1969, when he moved to New York. The “Purple Haze” singer died in 1970 at age 27.

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Jimi Hendrix isn’t the only famous musician with ties to the apartment building on Brook Street. Centuries before the rocker moved there, composer George Frideric Handel lived in the house next door for 36 years and wrote some of his most famous works, including "Messiah," there. Handel died at the home in 1759.

The side-by-side former dwellings of Jimi Hendrix and George Frideric Handel underwent the expensive restoration and are now part of the "Handel & Hendrix in London" heritage site which celebrates the two musicians who came from very different eras. Tickets to visit the Jimi Hendrix apartment in London cost £7.50 ($10.85), with joint tickets also available for the Handel house.