The Return of Design. The change at the helm of the museum offered an ideal opportunity to rethink the exhibition policy to date and revise it in light of the experiences gained since we first opened to the public. It thus seemed desirable to link the fields of Art and Design more closely in order to highlight the similarities and differences more clearly for our visitors. This was something that was previously not so easy given the prior strict distinction across separate floors.
Visitors will now pass through rooms that alternate between art and design on both storeys of the building, whereby each room is dedicated to a particular theme in art or design. The plan is that as of Spring 2008 design will gradually return to the museum one room after the next.
The opportunity to now present design across both storeys means we can opt for a thematic structure rather than the past approach, which was chronological. Thus the ground floor will focus on contemporary issues, and is reserved for new ideas and young designers, who via installations will have the opportunity to take the public stage.
Given the specific lighting levels there, the two rooms in the depths of the building will be reserved for Graphic Design and Photography, or for smaller cameo shows. On the first floor, the displays will feature classical product design. And here again the reinterpretation of our exhibition rooms means there will be an occasion to devote each room to a specific theme.
In addition to the vibrancy and multiplicity the different rooms offer thanks to the new approach, there is a practical advantage: The museum is more flexible and as a consequence at a later date individual room shows can be changed and a new theme introduced. Moreover, we seek to create a joint room dedicated to both art and design. This new spatial structure also quite naturally spawns a new substantive thrust that finds a new conceptual answer to the mission of a museum for art and design: Instead of layering, visitors will experience interweaving.

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