The museum is located in a restored building of the Fire Brigade, constructed in 1874 for the 1st part of the Simbirsk police department. Although contemporaries considered the building too economical and reminiscent of women's dresses of that time, all tight-fitting, it became one of the most notable historical monuments on Moskovskaya Street.

In the 1920s, the first fire station was located in this building, and until 1968, it housed the city fire station No. 3 of the Ulyanovsk city executive committee. During the Great Patriotic War, a workshop for repairing fire equipment operated here. Until 1979, the building housed a professional fire brigade and a technical service fire station. In 1979, the year of the 60th anniversary of the Soviet fire service, a permanent Ulyanovsk fire-technical exhibition was opened here.

Each stage of the Fire Brigade's history has left its mark on this building. In the 1930s, gates were installed on the southern facade, and windows and doorways were bricked up. In the second half of the 20th century, the internal layout was repeatedly changed.

The restoration returned the historical layout of the corridor and stables, where unique life-sized exhibits are now presented: a hand pump, a sled-type fire engine, and a spring-loaded line. These interactive exhibits can be seen from Lenin Street through the open arches of the main facade. In the stables, stalls of the 'model variant' have been restored. This part of the exhibition is the result of extensive research work by the museum staff. Unique exhibits related to the organization of fire protection in Russian cities of the 19th century can only be seen in Ulyanovsk. The pre-revolutionary section includes a complex of authentic materials and documents, dioramas, and virtual characters.

The Soviet period of fire service development is also reflected. It includes a complex of fire-technical equipment and a large section on fire prevention. The new exhibition features a restored garage, showcasing the life of the fire station in the 1940s-1950s, where a unique vehicle on a GAZ-AA chassis is displayed. This is the only one of five surviving vehicles of this brand in the world available to the general public.