BORUSSEUM | Club museum of Borussia Dortmund

When light brings history to life

For anyone with a black-and-yellow heart, a visit to the BORUSSEUM is a must. The club museum of Borussia Dortmund was extensively renovated and reopened its doors in April. The lighting design for the football museum comes from Felsch Lighting Design in Hamburg.

The BORUSSEUM first opened in 2008 in the north-east corner of the BVB stadium. It grew out of a fan initiative and remains independent of sponsors to this day, making it an advertising-free zone. Over time, however, the museum showed signs of wear and needed renovation. In April 2022, a new “black-and-yellow home” opened in the same place, with a new content, dramaturgical and staging structure and up-to-date technology, reviving memories and emotions among visitors and fans.

“The BORUSSEUM is a place in probably the most beautiful stadium in the world where the club's history is not just presented as in a museum but can be experienced ‘immersively’,” says Markus Felsch, whose practice Felsch Lighting Design is responsible for the light in the new museum. Immersive means that the exhibition can be experienced in a special way: fans and visitors literally immerse themselves in the different themed worlds.

The redesigned museum not only stages the sporting development of Borussia Dortmund but also documents the tradition of BVB's special fan culture. Numerous digital experience and edutainment stations offer a playful approach to 110 years of club history, bringing football history, great triumphs and defeats, goals and saves to life. The new museum concept was developed by the Viennese exhibition designers MACHEN. According to them, the BORUSSEUM has “arrived in the digital age and remains fully committed to the motto ‘by fans for fans’.” The themed worlds are clearly separated in space. This allows the exhibition designers to focus visitors' attention on one topic and filter out distractions. A clever combination of visual, auditory and interactive communication points intensifies the immersive experience.

Lighting challenges

“The interplay of light and shadow creates the contrast in which the message emerges.” Felsch Lighting Design designed the lighting in the BORUSSEUM according to this fundamental principle. The contrasts are natural brightness contrasts, but also, to a large extent, variations of the white-light chromaticity. The Hamburg lighting designers paid particular attention to the deliberate use of directed and diffuse light. All indirect light sources have a large light spread factor (LwF), i.e. diffuse light, while all accent lights have a very low LwF and therefore strongly directed light with very good contrast rendering. The accent lighting uses the proven Twist spotlights developed by Markus Felsch himself.

A special challenge for the lighting design was handling “BVB yellow”. BVB's corporate identity sets a striking contrast with its base colour “BVB yellow” on a black background, which is reflected in the exhibition design and the lighting concept. Technically, it was very demanding to make BVB yellow shine identically, in line with the CI specifications, at every selected room light intensity. Light lines developed specifically by Markus Felsch with a special LED technology now make this possible in the BORUSSEUM.

“Pictures or films can hardly convey the holistic experience of the BORUSSEUM,” explains Markus Felsch. “The only way is to visit the museum in person and experience the black-and-yellow BVB world with your own senses.”

Facts and figures

Project: BORUSSEUM Dortmund

Completion: April 2022

Client: Borussia Dortmund – www.bvb.de

Lighting design: Felsch Lighting Design, Hamburg – www.felsch.de

Exhibition design: MACHEN Ausstellungsbüro, Vienna – www.mchn.at

Architecture: SHA Scheffler Helbich, Dortmund – www.sha.de

Interior fit-out: Körling Interiors, Dortmund – www.koerling-interiors.de

Media installations: 5vorFilm, Dortmund – www.5vorfilm.de

Luminaire manufacturers: ERCO and custom developments by Felsch Lighting Design

Photos: Markus Felsch, Felsch Lighting Design