Museum Ostwall Guide

The Dortmunder U is a 1920s brewery tower that the city turned into an arts centre, and Museum Ostwall occupies its upper floors. The collection covers art from the early twentieth century onwards, with Expressionism at one end, the post-war avant-garde in the middle and Fluxus as the movement the museum is most associated with. If you only have time for one art museum in Dortmund, this is the one, mainly because the setting does half the work.

Inside the Ostwall collection

Expect a collection that is arranged by ideas as much as by date. Painting and sculpture sit alongside objects, film, sound and the paper ephemera that Fluxus artists produced, so the rooms feel more like a conversation between movements than a walk through a timeline. Some of this material is modest in scale and rewards slow looking, such as handwritten scores, postcards and little boxes of everyday things turned into art. If you arrive hoping for a parade of famous canvases, adjust your expectations.

The balance between collection displays, temporary shows and live events changes, so look at the museum's own programme before you go. Special exhibitions in the U may carry their own ticket even though general access to the building is free, a distinction we explain in our Dortmunder U guide.

Architecture of the brewery tower

The tower was built for the Union brewery, and the scale of the old fermentation halls still shows in the proportions of the lower floors. The big illuminated U on the roof is visible from the tracks as you arrive at the Hauptbahnhof, and it works as a landmark when you are crossing the western edge of the centre. Other tenants share the building, including a media-art association and university-linked cultural projects, so you will pass things that have nothing to do with Ostwall. That is part of the point of the place, as it is a working culture house, not a single museum with a lobby.

Take a moment on the way up or down to look at how the old structure has been kept legible. The industrial reuse here is the same story you meet outdoors at PHOENIX West, only told indoors and in a far more polished form.

Planning your visit duration

Plan on one to one and a half hours for a focused visit to the museum itself. Add a further hour if you want to look at the other floors and any free exhibitions, and more again if you like to sit with film or sound pieces. A rainy afternoon is the ideal slot, since there is no outdoor component and the visit is easy to start or abandon at short notice.

Recommended local pairings

• The football museum. The German Football Museum faces the station on the opposite side of the tracks from the U, so the two make a tidy day in which the subject changes completely halfway through.
• Unionviertel. The district behind the tower takes its name from the same brewery, and our Unionviertel guide suggests cafés and bars for an early evening afterwards.
• The MKK. If you want a second museum in the centre, the city's other central museum, the MKK, is currently in transition, so check what its special programme offers before you plan around it.

Suitability and practical advice

Ostwall suits visitors who enjoy being slightly puzzled by art, travellers who like industrial architecture and anyone who wants a counterweight to the football and steel themes elsewhere in the city.

It is less obvious for young children, who will find most rooms quiet and visual rather than hands-on, and for anyone looking for the story of Dortmund itself. For that you are better off at the Hoesch Museum or at the mining site of Zeche Zollern.

Pick a day when you are not on a tight schedule. The museum has the kind of rooms that look better when you are not checking the time, and the U is easy to reach on foot from the station, so there is no need to build a transfer into your plan.