BMW Museum Opens Interim Solution in Munich's Olympic Park

BMW Museum Opens Interim Solution in Munich

Exhibition area covering 1,200 square metres

June 23, 2004 8:27 AM
Filed Under: BMW, Classics

Press Release

The interim solution for the BMW Museum opened its doors on 18th June 2004. At the foot of the Olympic Tower in Munich's Olympic Park, BMW fans will be well provided for over the next three years. In an exhibition area covering 1,200 square metres, BMW Group Mobile Tradition - the heritage division of the BMW Group - will be displaying highlights from its two- and four-wheeled past.

Out of the bowl into the Globe

This interim solution will be housed in the "Globe". An inflatable structure resembling the earth's sphere, this is a spectacular piece of architecture which exerts a particular fascination when illuminated at night. The reason for this relocation from bowl to globe is that the 30-year-old Museum building (the so-called "bowl") is to undergo a complete refurbishment together with the BMW headquarters, the "four-cylinder". Hand in hand with this comes a new concept for the Museum, which will in future extend into the adjacent flat building. Information panels and video animations at the temporary exhibition site will afford a glimpse of the New BMW Museum of the future. In addition to the exhibits displayed in the Globe, a number of gems from BMW Group Mobile Tradition's collection will be on show in a connected hall. Displayed in this hall and in the Globe will be 19 cars and ten motorcycles whose history is conveyed to visitors through informative documentary material.

From DIXI to hydrogen car

Launching the exhibitions in mid-June will be a retrospective of 75 Years of BMW Automobiles, last shown at the 2004 Techno Classica. A journey through eight decades of car manufacturing leads visitors from BMW models of the first hour all the way to forward-looking hydrogen-powered cars. The curtain-raiser is a Wartburg motor car from Eisenach along with a DIXI DA/2 saloon. In a kind of journey through time, visitors will be able to experience the subsequent decades of BMW's history. From the 1930s and the 328 Mille Miglia Roadster, through the post-war years and the 1950s featuring the BMW 502 and the Isetta cars, all the way to models of the New Class and cars of the 1990s (the Z1 and Z8), this section of the exhibition encompasses a fascinating range of vehicles. Dynamism and environmentalism are not mutually exclusive, as exemplified in the exhibition by racing models and a BMW 7 Series with CleanEnergy drive.

Success story on two wheels: 100 years of Ernst Henne

On the motorcycle front, the special exhibition on the centenary of Ernst Jakob Henne taken from the Museum assumes a prominent role. Henne's fully faired world record-breaking machine, along with trophies and illustrated displays, portray exciting episodes from the life of BMW's most successful racer. The broad spectrum of models in the motorcycle division is represented by select two-wheelers ranging from BMW's very first bike, the R 32 of the year 1923, and an R 50 of 1950, all the way to an R 80 G/S off-road model of 1980 and a 1989 K1. In the entrance area, an aero-engine model indicates how it all started for the Bayerische Motorenwerke: in 1917, the BMW IIIa marked the series launch of BMW's very first product.