International trade show for museums,
cultural venues and tourist sites:
equipment, enhancement & innovation

March 25 and 26, 2025
Carrousel du Louvre, Paris

SITEM and the global museum

 

In preparation for the 29th edition, the founding principles of SITEM remain centred around the analysis and understanding of the global museum: its structure, its operation, its characteristics, its evolutions.

 

As showcased by the exhibitors, the SITEM has presented and analysed all the great technological evolutions of museums over the years. Today, everything is digital, the use of marketing is a given, and ticket offices are essential. A growing part of a museum’s activity is run much like a business. It is more and more important to create and develop their own resources. New objectives are being set and new players are getting involved. Transversality is now essential.

 

The SITEM is of course aware of the roles and permanent connections that museums have with their local areas. They have become attractive places to meet and have an important role to play in the local social life, sometimes even contributing to physical and mental health.

 

The SITEM has therefore most likely become the only event where public and private professionals from the cultural sector, the town council, the economy, territories and tourism can come together, share their expertise and work together. This will be a vital concept for the future.

SITEM Visitors

78%
from French and international cultural institutions

17%
people working in the cultural sector (architects, set designers, lighting specialists, etc.)

5%
from companies

“All” museums, and a great number of monuments, gardens, libraries, archives and cultural institutions are naturally drawn to the SITEM. But we would like to highlight three remarkable and rather noteworthy emerging trends with regards visitors to the event: internationalisation, cultural economy and cultural variety.

Cultural economy

Flanders investment & trade — France Museums Agency — Franco-German chamber of commerce and industry…

Internationalisation

Gallerie degli Uffizi (Florence) — The Museum of Marrakech — Ewha Womans University Museum (Seoul) …

Cultural variety

University of Leicester (GB) — Galerie Perrotin — Givenchy — Yacht club de Monaco — Open-air opera – AAU University …

Exhibitors at the SITEM

33%
showcasing collections and heritage sites

30%
concerned with the management, conservation and equipment for collections

19%
sponsorship, communication, public relations & management

12%
from museology and set design

6%
from cultural institutions and associations

Conferences and Workshops

The SITEM conferences bring together people from all over the world, and they are often based on rather original topics. As for the Workshops, they are a chance to get involved in some unparalleled case studies. These original, intellectual initiatives are constantly being renewed, and have become the main attractions of the SITEM.

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Start-Up Contest

This contest was created in 2017, and brings together 50 to 60 start-ups who have exhibited at the SITEM, in front of a distinguished jury from renowned institutions. This contest is an exceptional driving force for young budding entrepreneurs.

Musées (em)portables

The French Ministry of Culture describes this event as one of the “fifteen remarkable measures of tomorrow’s museum”. For this festival, participants film three-minute videos with their mobile telephone, while visiting museums. Some of them are hilarious, some tell a story, and participants are free to use their creative spirit as they wish.

Some images from the 2024 edition