Excellent Year for the BMW Museum

MULGRAVE, UNITED KINGDOM – September 28, 2009: The BMW Museum, reopened in 2008, sets benchmarks with its innovative and fascinating exhibition design, just as it did when it first opened in 1973. Since its reopening, the BMW Museum has raked in 14 internationally prestigious prizes.

Playing a pivotal role in these awards is the Kinetic Sculpture in the entrance area of the Museum. It represents the form-finding process in the car manufacturing sector. 714 computer-controlled metal balls suspended from fine steel strings display a range of shapes through their movements before the actual BMW design materialises.

Besides this sculpture, the outstanding design concept of the Museum’s so-called “Mediatecture” is attracting further prizes. The façades of the “Houses” in the new low-rise building are made up of LED surfaces which showcase the exhibits. The sections of the façades surrounding the central plaza in the Museum are made up of more than 700m2 of LED panels, comprising a total of 1.765 million light-emitting diodes that allow the surfaces to be actively illuminated and choreographed.

But it isn’t only the national and international media who are lauding the BMW Museum: its day-to-day visitors are just as impressed. Since the 2008 reopening, 500,000 visitors have come here to learn about the history of BMW. That ranks the BMW Museum second in Munich’s museum landscape after the Deutsches Museum.