The Goal
Making a History Museum Futuristic
The House of History wanted to redesign their online presence because of a great increase in mobile visits. The web design had to seamlessly align with the already existing corporate design of the museum’s print materials.
Additionally due to the museums huge variety of visitors, users had to be able to navigate the new website easily and intuitively. Short click paths had to give visitors quick access to the information they are looking for and allow them to conveniently discover the services provided by the museum. Alongside making the website more appealing for a highly diverse target audience, a solution was also needed for the future handling of the previously separate websites for special exhibitions.
Fortunately the museum already experienced and liked working with with the open-source content management system TYPO3, which laid the path for a successful game plan.
A Museum Visit Begins with the First Click
Based on the briefing and objectives, we began our conceptual phase and quickly identified a new goal: The website should present the state museum as a cultural highlight, make the place itself tangible online, and spark users’ curiosity for an in-person visit. Simply put: The website must lead the visitor into the museum. To achieve this, we expanded the relaunch objective and developed a digital strategy aligning with this goal.
The previously implemented microsites for special exhibitions were integrated into the main website to strengthen the overall presence. Our digital design concept enabled the individual exhibition themes to be united under the same umbrella of the museum's brand.
The content structure was adapted to the various target groups and now provides a clearly defined section for educational purposes, new and repeating visitors. Based on the existing corporate design, we created a TYPO3 website that not only offers a future-proof foundation for more content but is also easy for editors to manage and learn.
Connecting Web Design and Architecture
For the web design, we drew inspiration from the museum’s striking interior color scheme, architecture, and spatial atmosphere. This resulted in an immediate visual connection between the physical museum and the digital experience, supporting the overall digital brand development. The three corporate colors—red, violet, and yellow—which stand out immediately on-site, were incorporated into the main navigation and key areas of the page structure.
Large images help structure and break up the extensive information about exhibitions, serving as eye-catching visual elements.
To accommodate the increasingly mobile user behavior, the web design was developed responsively from the ground up - Starting with small smartphone screens, extending to tablets, and up to large desktop displays.
Bringing the Museum’s Identity into the Digital Space
The primary points of contact with visitors and customers are shifting more and more into the digital realm. Public and cultural institutions that fail to present themselves effectively online risk disappearing entirely from especially younger users awareness.
By building a digital brand, the museum’s established identity can be transferred into the online world, making the corporate website a central element of brand perception and allowing the corporate identity to be experienced digitally. This creates lasting benefits, which are essential online marketing factors.
Against this backdrop, we took on the challenge of translating the House of History and its physical visual identity into the digital space. Drawing on the existing print design and the museum’s distinctive architecture, a digital brand was created with a high level of recognizability.
Through this synthesis between the museum and the website, visitors take their first step into the museum the moment they land on the homepage. This positive development is also reflected in metrics such as click-through rates, social media reach, and improved search engine rankings.
The Success
Digital Self-Confidence for the House of History
The House of History now has a digital presence that reflects its cultural significance. The brand and its unmistakable visual identity were translated into the online space, creating a strong connection between the website and the physical museum. Users gain an immediate impression of what the museum is like, reducing the threshold that previously stopped user's from visiting in real life.
The museum’s unique corporate identity is now a strengthening factor of the institution’s overall digital presence.
Project Facts
House of History Baden-Württemberg
4 months Implementation period
Germany's first political-historical state museum
Linking architecture and web design
House of History
Founded in 2002, the Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg is the first political-historical state museum to tell the history of south-western Germany. In addition to the permanent exhibition on the history of the state, the museum delights its visitors with changing special exhibitions on special topics. With its striking and modern architectural style, the Haus der Geschichte is part of the ensemble of museum and government buildings on the Kulturmeile in the heart of Stuttgart.
Target Group
With its changing exhibitions, the Haus der Geschichte appeals to history buffs of all ages. The website's target group is correspondingly diverse and ranges from museum visitors, teachers and pupils who use the educational museum offerings for school education, to media representatives who report on the Haus der Geschichte and its exhibitions.
Tech Facts
Responsive web design with Bootstrap.
TYPO3
Individual extension development with Extbase.
Glossary
Corporate design (CD): A company's public image, determined by the design of various communication media and channels.
Corporate identity (CI): Unique identity of a company that is made up of design, communication, behavior and corporate culture.
Digital brand: Transfer of the brand image and brand identity into the digital space, taking into account SEO, social media and usability criteria.
Extbase: Framework of PHP classes for creating TYPO3 extensions.
Bootstrap: Open source framework that provides templates for web design elements based on HTML and CSS.