The Atmosphere of a Virtual Medieval Monastery

As part of our third digitization campaign in Munich, the 3D Lab team had the opportunity to take a short journey into the virtual past at Andechs Monastery. The day even began with a small surprise: as we left Munich Central Station at 8:30 a.m., it suddenly started to snow. An unexpected setting for a spring excursion, yet a fittingly atmospheric introduction to a day that would revolve around atmosphere, storytelling, and digital representation.

Since our VR tour was not scheduled to begin until 11:30 a.m., we used the time to explore the monastery itself. Andechs is one of the most important pilgrimage sites in southern Germany. Its history dates back to the Middle Ages and is closely linked to the noble House of Andechs-Merania, whose members collected sacred relics that turned the site into a major destination for pilgrims. Today, the monastery is home to a community of Benedictine monks who combine religious life with economic self-sufficiency, most notably through the monastery’s own brewery.

The Barque monastery church forms the spiritual and architectural centerpiece of the site. Its richly decorated altars, ceiling frescoes, and gilded ornamentation create the visual richness characteristic of Baroque art and architecture. This elaborate design serves not only an aesthetic purpose but also enhances the religious experience and devotion of visitors. At the same time, the church vividly illustrates the close relationship between material culture, religious practice, and visual communication.

VR Brewery Tour: Historical Potential, but Limited Execution

The first part of our visit was the VR brewery tour. Its content builds on a long-standing tradition: the brewery at Andechs Monastery is one of the last major monastic breweries in Germany and continues a brewing tradition that dates back to the Middle Ages. At that time, beer production not only served the monastery’s own needs but also provided an important source of income. Beer also fulfilled a practical function, serving as a nutritious beverage during periods when drinking water was not always safe.

Against this historical background, our expectations of the VR experience were correspondingly high. A virtual reconstruction of historical brewing processes offered considerable potential. It could have brought production techniques, workspaces, ambient sounds, and perhaps even the social interactions within the monastic community to life in an immersive way. However, the implementation fell short of these possibilities. Much of the experience consisted of 360-degree videos. While these provide an all-around view of the environment, they remain inherently passive: the user can look around but is never truly part of the scene. Compared with fully modelled 3D environments, this approach lacks both spatial depth and meaningful interactivity.

One particularly positive aspect, however, was the presentation itself. The tour guide led the experience in a relaxed, humorous, and highly accessible manner. His engaging style significantly enhanced the overall experience and ensured that the tour remained entertaining despite its rather passive design. This personal, almost narrative approach proved highly effective in communicating historical information in an enjoyable and approachable way.

Another highlight was a brief sequence at the beginning of the tour in which the monastery was visualized as it had appeared during an earlier historical period. This moment hinted at the immersive potential that the experience could have offered. However, it remained only a short introduction. There was no continuous “journey through time” that allowed visitors to actively experience the historical brewing process.

Our overall impression was therefore mixed. The content was informative and communicated effectively, but the possibilities offered by virtual reality were only partially realized. From a Digital Humanities perspective in particular, this raises the question of why greater emphasis was not placed on reconstructive, model-based approaches that could have created a more immersive and historically engaging experience.

Exploring the Virtual Monastery Pharmacy

In the second part of our visit, we experienced the VR station dedicated to the historic monastery pharmacy. Historically, monastery pharmacies were important centers of medical knowledge. Monks devoted considerable attention to medicinal plants, pharmaceutical recipes, and the preparation of remedies. Their knowledge drew on both ancient medical traditions and practical experience and was transmitted and refined over centuries. The VR experience builds on this historical context and provides an impression of what such a pharmacy may have looked like. The atmosphere is convincing, and exploring the environment is an enjoyable experience.

However, this installation also follows a largely linear and only minimally interactive design. Users move through predetermined scenes with limited opportunities for independent exploration. What is missing are small narrative or playful elements, such as hidden details, humorous moments, or interactive objects, that encourage closer observation and discovery. These kinds of features often make VR experiences particularly engaging. Their absence means that, although the experience is visually convincing, it remains less immersive and involving than it could be.

In addition, the experience exhibits a number of design shortcomings that reduce its immersive quality. For example, in one scene the chandelier was not modeled as a three-dimensional object but represented merely as a flat texture. While such simplifications may be understandable from a production standpoint, they can quickly become distracting in a VR environment—particularly for users who work professionally with 3D models.

Conclusion: Enjoyable VR Experiences and Untapped Potential

Overall, our visit to Andechs Monastery was an enjoyable and insightful experience. The combination of a historic site, cultural context, and digital interpretation is highly appealing and offers numerous points of inspiration, including for our own work in the 3D laboratory.

At the same time, our expectations as a Digital Humanities and 3D Lab team were naturally shaped by our own work with digital models, spatial reconstruction, and immersive environments. From the perspective of a general audience, both VR experiences function well: they are accessible, visually appealing, and communicate historical content in an entertaining way. From a more specialized perspective, however, we felt that the medium’s full potential remained only partially explored. Both the brewery tour and the monastery pharmacy experience could have offered more opportunities for active exploration, interaction, and spatial immersion. Put differently, the experience was enjoyable and well presented, but for us it also raised the question of how much further historical VR could go as a genuine form of “time travel.”

For us as a Digital Humanities team, the visit was nevertheless particularly valuable. It highlighted the strengths and limitations of current VR implementations and made several design decisions clearly identifiable. Immersion is created not only through convincing visual representation but also through meaningful interactivity, spatial coherence, and a consistent level of detail. Likewise, the experience demonstrated that historical content is conveyed most effectively when it is not merely presented visually but designed as an environment that users can actively experience.

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