Consulting and Support Centre for the Museums of Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg’s many museums and the rich diversity of its collections make this state in the southwest of Germany one of the most important in the country. In addition to the major museums run by the State government itself, there are also well over 1200 other museum facilities in private or local authority hands. The widely diverse exhibits in these local and regional museums are further enhanced by a range of specialist collections housed in other buildings.

The spectrum of museums and collections in the State includes natural history, arts and crafts, archaeology, ethnography, and history collections, castles, palaces, monasteries and churches, open-air museums and collections of technology and industrial heritage.

The State government of Baden-Württemberg has an important role in preserving cultural heritage, not only through the museums which it manages directly, but also through a shared responsibility for non-State museums. To help it fulfil this role, the State government has set up the Consulting and Support Centre for the Museums of Baden-Württemberg, serving museums in the region.

This office is the main contact for all non-State museums. As a government authority it falls within the Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts and is an independent department of the Regional Museum of Württemberg in Stuttgart.

Its task is to financially support measures aimed at preserving the collections. The seven open-air museums of the State of Baden-Württemberg receive special support from the centre. In addition scientific, educational and technical back-up is provided, and museums are regularly visited by the staff of the centre. In addition to professional consultation and support services for the museums, the centre also provides information and documentation.

General information is available on addresses, contact persons, scientific literature and publications; a museums database has also been set up. Another area of involvement is in-service training, with support given to conferences organised by the museums’ association of Baden-Württemberg, and to courses on conservation issues and computerised inventories, for example.

As part of its information services the centre also produces an exhibition calendar and a guide to the museums of Baden-Württemberg.