German Football Museum: completion in August, opening in October

Three years in the building, the German Football Museum will showcase the first permanent exhibition of the history of German football, featuring interactive multimedia offerings and more than 1,600 exhibits across a total area of 7,000 square metres.

"Our aim was to marry the wonderful tradition and timeless fascination of football at a special location. Visitors to the German Football Museum can look forward to an exhibition with exceptional exhibits and exciting audiovisual presentations," said DFB president Wolfgang Niersbach.

The German Football Association (DFB) launched the museum project after the 2006 World Cup in Germany, setting aside funds from the surplus made at the tournament and sponsorship monies totalling 17.5 million euros for the build. The state of North Rhine-Westphalia contributed 18.5 million euros to the construction costs. In total, the budget for building and fitting out the museum runs to 36 million euros. The city-centre plot was made available by the City of Dortmund as part of the award process for the museum site.

Dortmund mayor Ullrich Sierau said: "The German Football Museum will be a huge magnet far beyond the confines of Dortmund and establish an entirely new conceptual link between football and culture. The Rhine-Ruhr region is gaining another national and international attraction."

The museum is being built and operated by the not-for-profit DFB German Football Museum Foundation, a 50/50 joint venture between the DFB and the City of Dortmund. Commenting on the current build situation, general manager Manuel Neukirchner said: "The insolvencies of two participating companies have led to delays in the final phase of the build. We are in consultation with the provisional liquidator in order to prevent the construction work from coming to a complete halt in the affected trades through three-way agreements with subcontractors, as we did when the company responsible for the structure of the building went into insolvency. In spite of this frustrating delay, we will have the building and the permanent exhibition ready on budget in August and open the museum on completion of the required commissioning procedures in October."