Brauerei-Museum Dortmund

Description

In Dortmund, the Brauerei-Museum Dortmund documents the development of the regional brewing industry; after its founding in 1981 it opened on 12 November 1982 on the premises of the Privatbrauerei Dortmunder Kronen. The institution was established at the initiative of the brewery owner and made use of the former Schalander building and a storage cellar.

Conceived as a teaching museum, it displayed its exhibits across approximately 1,600 m². The brewery covered the ongoing costs, while the city of Dortmund, with support from the Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe, supported its establishment and scientific supervision. After the Kronen Brewery was acquired by the Dortmunder Actien-Brauerei in 1996, the museum lost its visitor base due to the closure of the brewery and construction work in the surrounding area; the municipal holdings were taken over and the museum was closed in 2000.

In 2006 the museum reopened with a revised concept on the site of the Dortmunder-Hansa-Brauerei, now the Dortmunder Actien-Brauerei, in the north of the city. The exhibition rooms are housed in the historic machine house dating from 1912 and in an adjacent machine hall from 1968. Unlike the earlier teaching museum, the current presentation places its emphasis on the history of Dortmund breweries in the 19th and 20th centuries, particularly on the so‑called "golden years" 1950–1970.

The tour begins in the former power centre with a steam engine, a refrigeration machine and an electric generator, and continues through thematic areas such as beer consumption, represented by a pub interior from the 1930s, beer advertising, bottle and keg filling, and export and transport—documented, among other items, by a Krupp truck from 1922. In the basement the production steps from raw materials to the storage cellar are shown; the exhibition concludes with insights into pre‑industrial and medieval brewing history.

Special exhibitions in 2009 were devoted to the anniversary of the football club Borussia Dortmund and, as part of RUHR.2010, to the newly opened Dortmunder U.