Europe's new and innovative museums

Europe rewards museums that are newly renovated of that have redesigned their presentation. The 2017 European Museum of the Year (EMYA) is Geneva's Museum of Ethnography (MEG - Musée d’ethnographie de Genève) in Switzerland. A total of 46 museums were nominated for the prize. Here are some of the candidates in Germany and Switzerland.

Dortmund's German Football Museum is located in this colorful, futuristic new building, opened in 2015 by the German Football Association. The is about more than just football; socio-political topics are also discussed. Visitors can learn why, in 1989, the European champion women's team only recieved a meager reception, or how the East German secret police were involved in the sport.

Initially, this museum in Heinsberg, Germany was a local history museum. Then, the decision was made to expand it by adding an extension. In the foreground of this picture are the famous painter and sculptor family Begas, which hail from Heinsberg. Visitors embark on an interactive journey through the region's history from the Romantic period to the "Gründerzeit" period of economic prosperity.

This historic fortress is situated in the mountainous region of Saxony, Germany. The new permanent exhibition provides an overview of the 800-year history of the castle and fortress and the 60 buildings that sit on the 9.5-hectare site. In the more than 20 years since the end of the German Democratic Republic, the museum has collected exhibition items and now has plenty to offer visitors.

Whoever enters the ecologically constructed visitors' center of the Swiss Ornithological Institute in Sempach, Switzerland can expect to see the world from a bird's perspective. Throughout the visit, visitors must think like a bird, deciding what to eat or where to live. At the end of the tour, visitors learn what kind of bird they resemble most based on their decisions.

The Town Hall Museum in Sempach was also nominated for a European Museum of the Year Award. Built in 1447, the building was renovated three years ago. Now, instead of only having capacity to show small exhibitions, the new and spacious four-storey museum can offer much more. Exhibitions about religion, as well as resistance to customs, are accompanied by multimedia features.

Very few items remain from the Hanseatic period, so a great deal of research and imagination are needed to reconstruct this era of history. At the new Hansemuseum in Lübeck, Germany has managed to recreate 10 Hanseatic sites, including the market square in Bruges and a hall in Lübeck. The few objects that remain from this period in the Late Middle Ages are displayed in small exhibition rooms.

In the Roman mine in Kretz, Germany, visitors can have a true hands-on experience. In addition to visiting the ancient mine, where tuff was once dismantled, visitors can also experience "Ancient Technology World," where machinery from Roman times and the Middle Ages like cranes, mills and byzantine marble saws can be tested.