Mercedes' monument to motion
by Michael Dumiak, FORTUNE Magazine

(FORTUNE Magazine) - Stuttgart, Germany German automakers are world-renowned for putting design in motion. Now their most breathtaking concepts are standing still: Mercedes, BMW, and Porsche are each opening showpiece museums featuring gleaming lines, curves, glass, innovative architecture--and, of course, cars that don't move.

First to the flag is Mercedes, which opened its $192 million shrine, the Mercedes-Benz Museum, in May. The building, designed by Dutch firm UN Studio, took eight years from drawing board to opening. It takes visitors on a twisting, double-helix pathway through 16,500 square meters of display space and 120 years of Mercedes history, beginning with the invention of the first gas-powered automobile by Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Benz in 1886.

BMW is scheduled to open its museum, BMW World, in Munich next spring, and Porsche's entry in Stuttgart will open soon after. All three are big, beautiful, and expensive ads--cathedrals to auto engineering. But they arrive as many carmakers are ailing; Mercedes cut 8,500 jobs last fall.

Along with a number of new auto factories, including Volkswagen's "glass factory" in Dresden and architect Zaha Hadid's BMW plant in Leipzig, they can be seen as either costly arrogance or faith in the future. In the meantime, the German automakers are expecting big crowds. Mercedes says one million people a year will walk through its Guggenheim Museum-inspired spiral showcase, and Porsche is expecting 200,000 visitors a year. Top of page

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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.