Americans are known as car fanatics, but indeed Germans have their own love affair with the automobile that is so strong automakers have built sprawling museums and other exhibits around their automotive factories.
The centerpiece of the Audi Forum and Museum in Ingolstadt, 45 minutes from Munich, is an elegant 1939 Horch 855 roadster with a rumble seat, designed and built by engineer August Horch, who worked briefly for Rudolf Benz before forming the company that would become Audi. The four rings of its logo represent the four companies which merged after WWII to become Audi - Horch’s, known for its luxurious vehicles; Wanderer, which specialized in low-cost models; DKW, which had been the world’s largest motorcycle producer; and NSU, which produced the Wankel rotary engine.
Models of each company are on display, including an early DKW motorbike with a leather chain, a 1927 Horch with the world’s first brake lights, unreliable two-stroke models of the 1950s and 1960s that nearly bankrupted the company, and Audi’s signature “Quattro” (all-wheel drive), which saved it. Two 16-cylinder racecars from the 1930s are on display, one a streamlined silver bullet that looks as modern as tomorrow.
The BMW museum looks like a silver soup-bowl, but this dish is filled with 25 themed areas, from the history of motorcycles to the future of hydrogen-powered cars and wind energy. Exhibits are heavy on technology, engineering and brand image. “Beemer” can boast firsts and favorites, and they are here, including the small, front-opening Isetta; the boxy 2002, which introduced Americans to the brand; BMW motorcycles, and the H2R, the record-shattering hydrogen-powered racecar whose technology propelled the 7 Series bi-fuel gas/hydrogen model that BMW already is producing.
In case you’re wondering, the blue and white circular BMW logo represents both the colors of Bavaria and the automaker’s roots in aviation motors. The newly expanded museum opened in June. The site includes the company’s iconic four-cylinder headquarters building and main factory.
The largest of all the German car museums, the Mercedes-Benz Museum takes visitors on a timeline of automotive and social history. Visitors start at the top of a spiral-walkway, at the beginning of automotive history, including the 1888 horseless carriage Gottlieb Daimler designed and built.
Each of the eight levels and side galleries has a theme - invention of the auto and truck, post-war miracle, through to global marketing. Ramps between levels feature historical photographs and videos that put the cars into context. The admission fee includes a high-tech audio guide that lets you choose between technology or historical events. There are more than 80 hours of video and narration, so spending less than a half-day here deserves a speeding ticket.
The pioneering section includes a wall of the company’s safety and technological introductions, including crumple-zone construction in 1959 and ABS in 1978. Of course, the iconic 300SL gull-wing is here.
The new Porsche museum, a futuristic design meant to look like it is floating - or racing - is scheduled to open this winter at the company’s headquarters in Zaffenhausen-Stuttgart. Until then, a few dozen historic Porsche cars and racecars, even a 1912 fire engine that Ferdinand Porsche designed for Daimler before he left to set up his own company, are jammed bumper to bumper, in a decidedly un-fancy, garage-like building.
There are cars that won the 24 Hour Le Mans, a 1964 Type 356 police car with blue lights on its roof, and an aerodynamic mid-engine racecar from 1958 that looks so much like a modern day Boxster it makes you blink.
At Volkswagen headquarters in Wolfsburg, there are two museums in this sprawling complex one-hour by high-speed train or the Autobahn from Berlin - a science and technology museum focusing on energy and transportation, such as biofuel and wind power, and a car museum. My two favorites are a 1936 Bugatti 57 with riveted seams that make the car appear to have an external backbone, and the one-millionth Beetle, celebrated with rows of sparkling rhinestones. Each of the VW brands has its own pavilion - the Czech brand Skoda focuses on Bohemian glass and art, not cars; Bentley shows off its racing heritage; Lamborghini displays a single yellow Murciellago amid a wall of smoke and mirrors.
Germany’s reverence for automobiles, and its automakers’ roles in driving forward this transportation mode that changed the world forever, is apparent in its collection of automotive museums.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.