There are two reasons for the Technik Museen Sinsheim Speyer to celebrate in 2021, as the Sinsheim museum turns 40 and the Speyer museum 30. Several coronavirus-compliant events are planned to take place at both locations throughout the year. But that's not all. Even if the current protective measures mean that the museums are temporarily closed, there is still plenty going on at the Technik Museum Speyer.
More modern and family-friendly
The museum's largest exhibit, the Liller Halle, which is over 100 years old, is busy at work. Exhibits are being removed or moved, vintage cars and organs are being covered with tarpaulins, painting, drilling, hammering and screwing is taking place. The historic hall gets an upgrade. The museum is using the winter months to modernize the exhibition and make it even more family-friendly with new concepts. Although the plans affect the entire hall, the museum still wants to make it possible for visitors to view the Liller Halle. The renovation will therefore be carried out in stages. This means that there are only a few restrictions for guests and they can even watch the work in progress.
The first area the museum's workshop team tackled was the historic fire engines. The previous white bricks in the exhibition areas are being replaced with a robust, red floor, some beams are being painted in aluminum silver and a separate fire station is being created for the younger visitors. The work is progressing well. The aim is to complete the first section by the anniversary in April 2021. This will be followed by the next exhibition areas within the hall. Information on the current status of the conversion can be found on the official website.
A building steeped in history
The listed Liller Halle is a striking example of industrial architecture from the time of the First World War. As the heart of the Technik Museum Speyer, the building has seen a lot. This makes it all the more important to carry out the work with great sensitivity. "In recent years, the Speyer site has mainly seen the construction of new buildings, such as the space hall or the Hangar 10 restaurant. There has never been such a complex renovation in the museum's 30 years," explains museum director Andreas Hemmer. The workshop team, including its own carpenters and painters, is in action every day. There is experience of redesigns from the parent museum in Sinsheim. Over the past two years, various exhibitions such as the American Dream Cars Collection or the Blue Flame and Concorde areas have been redesigned there. Together with our colleagues in Sinsheim, we are gradually implementing the various measures in the individual sections.
The history of the Liller Halle in the Technik Museum Speyer
The hall was built in 1913 in Lesquin near Lille (northern France) on behalf of the Thomson company (Houston, USA). But it was not to remain there for long. When Pfalz Flugzeugwerke, based in Speyer, was thinking of producing so-called giant aircraft for the military in 1917, they were looking for a suitable production hall. But where would the material come from in the middle of the war? The resources to build a new hall were too scarce. For this reason, they looked around the occupied territories and found what they were looking for in northern France. The hall in Lesquin was completely dismantled by the German troops, transported to Speyer and rebuilt.
The five-nave building has a floor area of almost 8,000 m2 and consists of an iron and steel structure, the frame of which is firmly walled up with bricks. Its weight was estimated at 700 tons. After its reconstruction in 1918, however, the hall was not in German hands for long. After the end of the First World War, in December of the same year, the French military moved in and occupied the Liller Halle with its military automobile park. In 1926, the Liller Halle and the site of the former Pfalz aircraft factory returned to German ownership. From 1937 to 1945, it was used by the newly founded Saarpfalz aircraft works for repairs and production work for the German air force. After the Second World War, however, the French military occupied the site again. In 1956, most of the old buildings were demolished and barracks were built for French soldiers instead. Only the boiler house, the Liller Halle and the administration building (now the Wilhelmsbau Museum) remained. From 1961 to 1984, the first regiment of Spahis took over the barracks site. But this era also came to an end.
From neglect to new use
After the withdrawal of the French troops, everything was handed over to the Federal Property Office as former property of the German Reich. The site and the associated buildings stood empty from this point onwards. As the area was not used, it gradually fell into disrepair. Homeless people lived in the barracks, a circus spent the winter in the Liller Halle, windows were smashed, walls were graffitied and large parts of today's Wilhelmsbau fell victim to a fire. Where airplanes were once manufactured, a picture of destruction now presented itself. But this was to change. The purchase of the site by the museum association laid the foundation stone for the Technik Museum Speyer. Renovation work began in August 1990.
A lot had to be done. Around 100 containers of garbage and debris were disposed of, 1,500 panes of glass and 7,000 meters of electrical cable were installed. Painting the interior and exterior of the Liller Halle alone required 26 tons of paint. But all the work and effort was worth it, because on April 11, 1991, the Technik Museum Speyer, with the Liller Halle as its exhibition hall, was officially opened.
