Que voir à Vienna

Was first mentioned in a document dated 1572 and is the only equestrian institute in the world which follows a Renaissance model of classical schooling. Eleves, or students, begin their training immediately after completion of Austrian primary education (age 15 or 16), and are expected to be both sporty and clever.…

Card catalogs may be an anachronism in today’s digitized world, but this library had the first one in existence, invented by the Habsburg court librarian. Unlike the printed library catalogs of the past, bound into book form, the card catalog could be rapidly updated and the library kept up-to-date.…

To see the combination of new modern with old historic architecture, visit the gasometers that have been revitalized from gas-tanks to new multi-functional buildings. The gasometers are four former gas tanks, built as part of the Vienna municipal gas works Gaswerk Simmering in 1896-1899, and used from 1899 to 1984 as gas storage tanks.…

Yet another example of the gruesome divide-and-conquer burial strategy of the Habsburg dynasty. It is said that other dynasties waged countless wars to acquire new lands, but you, happy Austria, marry. Even in death, the Habsburgs placated three different churches with the honor of caring for their remains. The best known, the Kapuzinergruft, contains their actual bodies.…

Architect Josef Maria Olbrich built this Jugendstil (German-style Art Nouveau) building 1897-98 as a display space for artists working in the new Secession artistic movement. It is topped by a giant, frothy golden ball, lovingly called Krauthappel by the Viennese, but the building was definitely not loved when it first opened.…

With nearly 3 million graves and covering an area of almost 2.5km², this is one of the largest cemeteries in Europe. It has an interdominational character, being subdivided into Catholic, Protestant, and two Jewish sections (one of which is still in use); recently added divisions include Russian Orthodox, Buddhist, Muslim, and Mormon.…

Inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1996. It is the ultimate palace experience in Vienna, because the Habsburg summer palace can be found here. It is comparable in grandeur to Versailles and is definitely a must-see in Vienna. The palace has seen its fair share of excitement over the years, including a meeting between John F.…

This year-round amusement park (map available [http://www.praterservice.at/assets/content/prater-folder-plan.pdf here]) was established in the late 18th century, and is most famous for its Riesenrad (see listing below).…

Houses the largest furniture collection in the world. The exhibit displays furniture for all the Austrian emperors since Charles VI (the father of Maria Theresa), furniture by the Thonet Brothers, Jugendstil, and the Viennese Modernist movement. In addition, they show other contemporary Austrian architects and designers, such as E.A.…

This 16th-century palace is said to have been built on the spot where Sultan Süleyman camped during the first Turkish siege of Vienna in 1529. After the 17th century the complex fell into disrepair, with parts reused for other building projects, and after 1945 it was converted to a storage facility and factory.…

Even an avowed hater of modern art can appreciate this. This is Hundertwasser's (born Friedrich Stowasser in 1928) major contribution to the Viennese art world.…

During a short period from 1919 to 1933, the city of Vienna erected some 65,000 apartments of high quality for the impoverished working class. Highly noticeable is also the contemporary architecture of these buildings all across town, of which several interesting ones are clustered on a short stretch along Gürtel road.…

The university was founded in 1365, and is the oldest university in the German-speaking area, as well as one of the largest in Europe with more than 90.000 students. It consists of 15 faculties amongst them are Law, Mathematics, Physics, Psychology and Translational Studies.…

Yet another patchwork of architectural styles, but predominantly Gothic. None of the original construction remains, the oldest extant sections are the thirteenth century Giant Gate (Riesentor) and Towers of the Heathens (Heidentürme), both of which are Romanesque. In 1511, building in Gothic style ceased due to being out of fashion. The main altar has a Baroque panel showing St.…

Two previous churches were located here, the most recent a Baroque building from the 18th century, which despite massive popular protest was demolished in 1965 due to traffic considerations. The new steel and concrete church was designed by the German architect Rudolf Schwarz and built between 1961-1965.…

The Ringstraße circles the very heart of Vienna. Built on the location of the original city walls, its size is a good indication of how much the city has expanded since medieval times, but more importantly it is the most posh area of downtown.…

One of the world's greatest art museums and in a palace that is a work of art itself. Serious art fans may wish to devote more than a day to its treasures. There is no other word to describe the Kunst other than mind boggling. It contains a world-class exhibit of the Habsburgs' art collection, including Raphael, Titian, Caravaggio, Bosch, and Brueghel.…

An English engineering firm (Walter Basset) built the giant ferris wheel from 1896-97. Others of the same era, built for world exhibitions and other parks in Chicago, London, Paris, etc. have long since been torn down. The Riesenrad has become a well-known symbol of Vienna, featured in many movies (most famously in The Third Man) and picture postcards.…

The Flower Gardens of Hirschstetten are run by the City of Vienna. The Gardening Department fosters their plants, which are then used in public gardens and parks. In the public section, several themed gardens (Chinese, Mexican, etc.) are installed; there is a preserved farm with petting zoo, an educational beehive, some turtles, owls and wild cats.…

A waste incinerator may not be the usual item to attract a visitor's attention, but after the Viennese painter/architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser restyled the plant's façade in 1989 (following a fire in 1987), it has become a surprisingly photogenic fixture in the cityscape.…

Built between 1927 and 1930 by the Otto Wagner's student Karl Ehn, the Karl Marx-Hof is a public housing complex (called "Gemeindebau" in Vienna), from the time of the social-democratic public housing programme during Austria's First Republic.…

One of the most important Neo-Gothic religious architectural sites in the world, constructed between 1856 and 1879. Stands on a large square on the location where an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Emperor Franz Joseph took place in 1853.…

One of the bigger social housing projects of the "Red Vienna", the Goethehof was built 1928-1930 as living blocks (~700 appts.) surrounding a courtyard. The architectural style is modern-functionalist with some art déco-elements. As all of the housing projects of the social democratic Vienna (1919-1933), it was a quantum leap in housing quality for the working class.…

Vienna's oldest preserved Jewish cemetery, in use from the 16th century until 1784. In 1941 Nazi officials decided to raze the cemetery; in response a number of Viennese Jews removed 931 gravestones and buried them at the Zentralfriedhof. In the 1980s 280 of the original gravestones were rediscovered and relocated to their original locations. The cemetery was resanctified in 1984.…

This museum was erected as a mirror to its twin museum, the Museum of Fine Arts. It exhibits various minerals, meteorites, fossils, stuffed animals, and skeleton reconstructions of dinosaurs and other. It also includes an anthropological section, where you can see the beautiful Venus of Willendorf which is 25,000 years old.…

A completely new city area currently under construction. One of the biggest development areas in Europe, it will accommodate 20.000 inhabitants by 2025, currently 5.000 are living on the grounds of a former airfield.…

This is a pair of anti-aircraft defense towers/bunkers, built by the Luftwaffe during WWII. During construction multiple rail tracks were laid across the park, and it is believed that hundreds of war victims were buried in mass graves on the grounds, still undiscovered. At 55m high, the round Gefechtsturm (G-Tower, or gun tower) is the highest flak tower built during the war.…

A marvelous zoo, with a rain forest glasshouse, tiny apes, aquariums with sharks, and terrariums with reptiles and venomous snakes. It is in one of the surviving air raid shelters from WWII, a so-called Flakturm. The building formerly housed some of the first radar equipment, and is designed to withstand a direct bomb hit, an earthquake, and wind speeds up to an overpressure of ten bar.…

Honouring the jazz musician Fatty George (1927-1985), a small museum about his life and jazz in general was opened in his native village Essling, now part of Vienna. It was installed inside a historic toilet building in a park. The park was renamed Jazzpark and a sculpture depicting jazz (the musical style) was erected in 2005 by Leopold Grausam.…

This trio of museums includes the Imperial Apartments (Kaiserappartements), Sisi Museum, and Imperial Silver Collection (Silberkammer). The Imperial Apartments and Sisi Museum include 22 state rooms of the residential and state apartments of Emperor Franz Joseph I and Empress Elisabeth (popularly known as Sisi) and show 19th-century imperial life.…

Inspired by the Weißenhofsiedlung in Stuttgart and initiated by architect Josef Frank, the Werkbundsiedlung public estate housing project in the Lainz Municipality of Hietzing was built from 1930 to 1932 by numerous national and international architects of the time (amongst those famous names like Adolf Loos and Gerrit Rietvelt) and has fine examples of Bauhaus style architecture.…

The palace was built in the early 18th century, and expanded in the late 18th century under the ownership of Prince Adam von Auersperg. Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach drew up the first plans; later designs are attributed to Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt. In 1945 the Austrian resistance group O5 (meaning OE = Oesterreich) met here.…

This museum is located in a former depot and houses a comprehensive collection of vintage vehicles and explaining the history of Viennese public transport. The exponat's range includes horse-drawn streetcars from 1868, a steam train set from 1885, many electric streetcars from the 1910s until the recent past, buses from 1949-1978, the infamous "Reichsbrücken-Bus".…

Originally built in the 15th century, the church was burned down in 1529 and 1683, during the first and second Turkish sieges of Vienna, and severely damaged during WWII. However one treasure did survive: the organ, on which both Beethoven and Schubert used to perform.…

A museum documenting the history of Vienna's substantial Jewish community which included Zweig, Freud, Herzl, Mahler, and Schoenberg. Three sites are available for one combined ticket: two museum sites and the main synagogue. Attached to the museum at Judenplatz are the archaeological remains of a medieval synagogue.…

Court painter Joseph Selleny and garden director Rudolf Siebeck designed this kind of artificial park with several small landscapes. It opened on the 21st of August 1862. One can finds in it the golden statue of Johann Strauss, which is most frequently photographed monuments in Vienna. You can also find the monuments of Franz Schubert, Franz Lehár, Robert Stolz and Hans Makart.…

A 16m-high stone Gothic column, erected by the Master Michael Knab at the end of the 14th century. According to medieval legend the column was erected in thanks for the safe return of a husband from the crusades.…

The best part of the Hofburg and an absolute must. It contains the Habsburgs' collection of jewels, crowns, and other valuables, perhaps the best on the Continent. Second only to a tour of the Kunsthistorisches Museum itself, of which the Schatzkammer is officially a part.…

A large 4m-diameter musical clock on a pedestrian bridge connecting two neighboring buildings. The clock was designed between 1911 and 1914 by the Judgenstil painter Franz Matsch, and features prominent figures from Viennese history, each with a Roman character. At noon all figures parade across the clock face, accompanied by music.…

Beginning in 1918 with the outbreak of the Spanish Flu, the tram was used to transport corpses, mostly at night. The practice was halted until the outbreak of WWII, when it resumed with three specially retrofitted streetcars; the practice was finally halted following the close of the war.…

This is a relatively new and special museum devoted to an interactive learning experience. It covers the history of the Vienne Philharmonic Orchestra, the history of Vienna as a centre of music making (Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Mahler, Schubert and others are documented).…

A huge museum featuring weapons and military maps from different periods. You can also see the open-top car in which Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the last Austrian prince, was shot in Sarajevo. His death triggered World War I and the eventual downfall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.…

Contains recent Austrian and international art from the past two centuries. Viennese art from the early twentieth century is well-represented in the permanent collection Vienna around 1900 and the Art of the Classical Modern, and includes masterpieces from Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, and Egon Schiele, as well as ear…

Dedicated to the patron saint of Vienna, this small church was first established in 1679, and its current appearance dates to the first part of the 18th century. The building is situated on top of 425m-high Leopoldsberg, with lovely views of Vienna and the surrounding area.…

Graves of famous composers including Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, Strauss, and Schönberg are all located here, as well as the graves of other luminaries. Mozart's gravestone however is just a memorial, as he was buried in a mass grave in St. Marx Cemetery.…

This 18th-century building is located atop the Mölker Bastei, one of the only remaining sections of the old city wall. For 8 years Beethoven lived in a 4th-floor apartment in this building, where he composed his 4th-8th symphonies as well as his opera Fidelio.…

This small museum is in Freud's historic flat where he practiced psychoanalysis for almost his whole life. However, the collection is limited mostly to documents of various kinds relating to Freud's life.…

An unusual museum dedicated to the work of the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism (Wiener Schule des Phantastischen Realismus), highlighting works by artists Ernst Fuchs, Arik Brauer, Rudolf Hausner, Wolfgang Hutter and Fritz Janschka.…

Housed in a squat tower, which once was an insane asylum, the Narrenturm (Fool's Tower), this museum contains some of the dustier corners of the annals of medicine. You will find preserved hydrocephalic infants, wax castings of tertiary syphilis, antique medical devices, and even a laryngeal tuberculous ulcer.…

A late 19th-century palace in the Lainzer Tiergarten, a wooded area formerly used for hunting by the Habsburg family. The imperial apartments with their furnishings have been preserved, and feature murals by prominent Viennese artists of the day, including Franz Matsch, Hugo Charlemont, Georg und Gustav Klimt.…

Steffl's intended twin, this tower was never finished. Over fifty years later, in 1579, a Renaissance spire was added to the Nordturm to make it look less like the builders had stormed off the job. This is where the Pummerin, a huge bell cast from melted-down Turkish cannons, hangs.…

Designed by Adolf Loos and completed in 1909, this is considered to be one of the most significant buildings of the Wiener Moderne era from 1890-1910, although initially it was fiercely criticised.…

This museum houses a collection of artifacts from the Roman settlement of Vindobona, as Vienna was then known. There are Roman ruins in the cellar of the museum itself, first discovered during construction work in 1948, and for many years only accessible to the public via a narrow staircase, before the building was tra…

This newly renovated museum exhibits machines, transportations, electronic equipment, and the like from their first design up to their current form. It also depicts the development of Vienna as a city, on all its technical aspects, including recycling, power, sewage.…

Believed to be the oldest church in Vienna, although recent excavations around the foundations of two other churches (Stephansdom and Peterskirche) have challenged this view.…

A private collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein is exhibited in his former Viennese residences, which include the Stadtpalais (City Palace) and Gartenpalais (Garden Palace). The richly decorated picture gallery mainly exhibits Baroque paintings, with a nice portion of Rubens.…

After the Kirche am Steinhof (see listing in Vienna/Outer West), this is second most well-known example of Jugendstil sacral architecture, designed by Max Hegele and built in 1911.…

A Baroque garden which has remained fundamentally unaltered since it first opened to the public in 1779, and popular for locals. Highlights include the Gloriette, offering grand views over the gardens, a children's Maze (Irrgarten) and Labyrinth, and the Crown Prince Garden (Privy Garden or Kronprinzengarten).

At 171 metres (561 feet), the tower was Vienna's the tallest building until the DC Tower was completed across the Danube, and continues to be a poignant landmark of the district. It was designed by the architects Gustav Peichl, Boris Podrecca and Rudolf Weber.…

The original chapel of the Palace, built in Gothic style 1447-1449, was made over in Baroque style. On Sundays and Catholic holidays (of which the Austrians celebrate many), the Court Musicians perform here.…