Autor: Michael Würzelberger

The Julius Meinl house (Meinlhaus) in the inner city at Fleischmarkt 7 was built in 1899 as a trading house for Julius Meinl based on a design by Max Kropf. The building, with its plaster façade and neoclassical décor by Wilhelm Hejda, features stucco reliefs with the coats of arms of the cities of Hamburg, Trieste and London as well as an ornate grille with the inscription “Julius Meinl Kaffee Import” in reference to the coffee trade.

The career of Julius Meinl II (1869-1944) and his rise to become the largest food retailer in the monarchy also began here in his father’s store.

The memorial plaque for Billy Wilder at the entrance is also worth noting. The famous screenwriter, director and 6-time Oscar winner lived there during his school days (at the private Juranek grammar school in the 8th district). At times he was in the same class as the later film director Fred Zinnemann (5 Oscars), whom he met again in Hollywood and remained friends with for the rest of his life.

View of the Volksgarten (People’s Garden) from the roof of the Natural History Museum, with the Burgtheater in the background.

The Hufschmidhouse (blacksmith’s house) on the corner of Neuer Markt – Kupferschmiedgasse – Seilergasse in the 1st district, built in 1784, was rebuilt in 1967 by the Austrian Arch. Georg Lippert in 1967, the smooth façades with plain windows so typical of the Josephinian style have fortunately been preserved.

This style, also known as the Plattenstil or Josephine Baroque, exemplifies the transition to Classicism with its sober, austere structure and, in addition to replacing the Theresian late Baroque, also represents the new political conditions of enlightened absolutism under Emperor Joseph II.

From the end of the 19th century, the building housed a private hospital and since 1985 the first floor has been home to the city branch of the Oberlaa spa confectionery, which was founded around 10 years earlier on the occasion of the construction of the Oberlaa spa center with spa garden.

The almost 62,000m2 Wertheimsteingarden in Oberdöbling in the 19th district was created as early as 1835 by the Austrian textile manufacturer, art collector and patron Rudolf von Arthaber as a private garden with a country house, the Villa Wertheimstein. After his death, Leopold von Wertheimstein acquired the park and villa in 1867, and 50 years later his daughter Franziska bequeathed the estate to the City of Vienna. In 1967, the Döbling District Museum was established in the villa and a wine museum was set up in the adjoining “Nonnenstöckl”.

A number of statues in the park still commemorate the salon as a central meeting place for liberal personalities in Vienna, which was founded by her mother Josephine. In addition to the writers Ferdinand von Saar, Franz Keim and Eduard Bauernfeld, there is also a bust of the Austrian officer and politician Julius Schlegel, the “savior of the art treasures of Montecassino” from the Nazis.

The charming park, which slopes steeply down to the former Krottenbach valley and Danube Canal valley, is home to many old and exotic plants, a garden for the blind created in 1959 (only partially preserved) and, since 1992, a biotope for lizards.

Due to the great success of the specially tanned and dyed gloves, the production of the former imperial and royal glove factory J.E. Zacharias moved in 1886 to the three-storey factory building planned by Gustav Matthies from Mecklenburg in today’s 19th district near the Danube. Due to the high demand for water, the location of the elongated brick building, with the gables typical of the planner in the early Italian Renaissance style, in Nußdorf, which was still a suburb at the time, was ideal.

With the help of ultra-modern machines powered by steam and their own dynamos, around 300 employees produced up to 10,000 gloves per week, a large proportion of which were destined for export all over the world. After the death of the factory owner in 1904, the now listed building was used as an important print shop for lithographed posters and metal sheets until 1970 and then as a second-hand goods and antiques shop.

For more than 10 years now, the building has been used as “Haus Damaris”, a Caritas facility providing refugee accommodation and basic care for around 220 people. Volunteers and donations in kind are also sought via a dedicated FB group.

One of the highlights of a tour of the Prater Cottage in the 2nd district is the impressive clubhouse for the former “Cycling Club of State and Court Officials” in the Prater, designed by Austrian designer and Secession architect Joseph Maria Olbrich. The central wooden main front, designed as a wide portal niche, is a reminiscent of the entrances to the pavilions of the Vienna city railway stations by Otto Wagner.

Olbrich received the commission in spring 1898, one month after the start of construction of the important Viennese Secession building near the Ringstrasse, which he had planned in the Viennese Art Nouveau style.

Shortly after completion, the club expanded from cycling to tennis. The pavilion, which has remained relatively undamaged despite various adaptations, is still used for this purpose today by the same club – now “SV Schwarz-Blau”.

Interested in a tour of Vienna’s historic bourgeoisie? Just send me an e-mail.

The 113m long and up to 28m high Palm House in Schönbrunn Palace Park was first built in 1880-1882 according to plans by Arch. Xaver Segenschmid by the “k. und k. Hofschlosser und Eisenconstructeur” Ignaz Gridl and is one of the largest plant houses of its kind in the world.

State-of-the-art technology was built into the iron construction, which was extremely expensive even for the time, including a steam water heating system to create different climate zones for the Habsburg collection of exotic plants. There was also criticism of the use of marines to fix (and later clean) the 45,000 or so panes of glass with window putty. After massive damage during the Second World War and only gradual repairs, an almost 14-year renovation was later necessary, which was then completed in 1990.

Particularly noteworthy plants include a 350-year-old olive tree, a specimen of a Wollemia, a plant species that was only discovered in 1994, a home-grown Seychelles palm and the azalea collection. The former central “Maria Theresa Palm” and the subsequent “Sisi Palm” each had to be cut down as they threatened to burst through the roof.

The 2001 monument to Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741) in the Votive Park next to the Votive Church made of Carrara marble by Italian sculptor Gianni Aricò shows a group of figures with three female musicians, probably an allusion to Vivaldi’s teaching activities at the “Ospedale della Pietà” in Venice, formerly an orphanage for girls, where he gave young women access to the concert business.

In front of it is an inclined plate with a metal relief and a portrait of the famous Venetian-Italian baroque composer and violinist, who was also ordained as a Roman Catholic priest at the age of 25.

The initiators of the monument – the Vienna and Venice Lions Club – wanted to create a symbol of international understanding between Italy and Austria as well as a reminder of Vivaldi’s move to Vienna in 1740, where he died just 10 months after his arrival, unnoticed by the music world, and was buried in the Bürgerspital cemetery in front of the former city wall on today’s Karlsplatz, which is also commemorated by a memorial plaque.

Evening view of the Danube Canal with a reflection of the inner city skyline at the „IBM Center“ on Obere Donaustraße in Leopoldstadt. The striking office building from 1969 was built according to plans by Viennese Arch. Georg Lippert on the site of the former Diana baths and renovated in 1999-2001.