{"id":27423,"date":"2020-10-04T05:15:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-04T04:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/?p=27423"},"modified":"2025-05-29T17:47:13","modified_gmt":"2025-05-29T16:47:13","slug":"palais-herberstein","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/sights\/winter-palace\/palais-herberstein\/","title":{"rendered":"Palais Herberstein"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/herbersteinsmall.jpg\" alt=\"Roof of Palais Herberstein\" class=\"wp-image-27426\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/herbersteinsmall.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/herbersteinsmall-100x100.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>Michaelerplatz square has its fair share of buildings rich in history and one example is Palais Herberstein. Though this proud townhouse might be more famous for its predecessor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Constructed just before 1900<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Built on the site of Palais Dietrichstein, which housed Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl (a legendary literary coffee house)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Book a two-hour historical <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tiqets.com\/en\/vienna-walking-tours-l205287\/?partner=visitingvienna&amp;tq_campaign=LG_WalkingTours\" rel=\"sponsored\">walking tour<\/a>* in Vienna<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>See also:\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/sights\/michaelerplatz-2\/\">Michaelerplatz square<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/sightseeing\/hofburg\/\" data-type=\"page\" data-id=\"2708\">Hofburg complex<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">A Caf\u00e9 trumps a Palais<\/h2>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/palaisherberstein.jpg\" alt=\"Palais Herberstein\" class=\"wp-image-48143\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/palaisherberstein.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/palaisherberstein-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\">(Once a haunt of famous writers)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Herberstein aristocratic family owned huge swathes of the province of Styria. Back in the mid-19th century, Count Herberstein also came into ownership of Palais Dietrichstein, an impressive building on the edge of Vienna&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/sightseeing\/hofburg\/\" data-type=\"page\" data-id=\"2708\">Hofburg palace complex<\/a>, where the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/culture\/habsburgs\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"12848\">Habsburg monarchs<\/a> lived and &#8220;worked&#8221;. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The end of that century was an era of massive redevelopment in the city, with buildings shooting up all over the place. No surprise, then, that Herberstein decided to rebuild his property; architect Carl K\u00f6nig put up a new palais in the late 1890s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This Palais Herberstein took the adjoining imperial residence as its role model, and this included adding a dome on top. Which sounds reasonable in theory, but some observers of the time thought it a little disrespectful to pretend to some kind of equivalence with the emperor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anyway, various redevelopment works saw the dome disappear and the building grow in height to today&#8217;s imposing construction that guards the entrance to Herrengasse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The coffee house connection<\/h3>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"395\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/herberstein1896.jpg\" alt=\"Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl in an 1896 painting\" class=\"wp-image-61178\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/herberstein1896.jpg 395w, https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/herberstein1896-263x300.jpg 263w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 395px) 100vw, 395px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\">(An outside view of the palais from 1896, just before its demolition I think. Painted by Franz Kopallik; Wien Museum Inv.-Nr. 166629; excerpt reproduced under the terms of the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY 4.0 license<\/a>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Although a fine building in its own right, Palais Herberstein&#8217;s place in Viennese history comes largely through its predecessor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Palais Dietrichstein went up around about the same time that Wellington and friends put an end to Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Some 30+ years later, a chap named Heinrich Griensteidl moved his coffee house into the building. His imaginatively-named <em>Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl<\/em> disappeared a few decades later along with Palais Dietrichstein.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Under normal circumstances, a 19th-century caf\u00e9 barely deserves comment. It&#8217;s not like Vienna had a paucity of them. But Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl played a key role in the rise of the coffee house as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/eatingdrinking\/coffee-house-experience\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"1947\">driver of cultural change and intellectual discussion<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div align=\"center\"><em>Ad:<\/em><br><\/div><div data-tiqets-widget=\"discovery\" data-cards-layout=\"horizontal\" data-slug-ids=\"exp206741,exp238032\" data-partner=\"visitingvienna\" data-tq-campaign=\"DA_ConcTour\"><\/div><script defer src=\"https:\/\/widgets.tiqets.com\/loader.js\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:25px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>The high point of this phenomenon came in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/culture\/wiener-moderne\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"28303\">years around 1900<\/a>, when Vienna was a seething mass of intellectual progression and creativity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All sorts of artists, architects, philosophers, politicians and the like would meet in the city&#8217;s coffee houses. Think Freud and Klimt, for example. And the list of coffee house intelligentsia included numerous authors, of course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl was a famous early protagonist of this cultural movement and known particularly for the writers that collected within its walls, including the <em>Young Vienna<\/em> group that featured the likes of Felix Salten (author of <em>Bambi<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" src=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/cafegriensteidl1896inside.jpg\" alt=\"Inside view of Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl in 1896\" class=\"wp-image-72650\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/cafegriensteidl1896inside.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/cafegriensteidl1896inside-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\">(Interior of Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl, as painted by Reinhold Richard d. J. V\u00f6lkel in 1896; Wien Museum Inv.-Nr. 62352; excerpt reproduced under the terms of the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY 4.0<\/a>&nbsp;license)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The German word <em>Kaffeehausliteratur<\/em> actually refers to &#8220;coffee house literature&#8221;: writing completed in whole or part in a coffee house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Most consider Vienna the traditional home of <em>Kaffeehausliteratur<\/em>, which finds its modern global expression when authors sit in Starbucks using the Wi-Fi on their laptops. (Ironically, there&#8217;s a Starbucks on the other side of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/sights\/michaelerplatz-2\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"27254\">the square<\/a> from Palais Herberstein.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Caf\u00e9 Griensteidl remains a cultural beacon in the consciousness of many Viennese. So much so that the name made an occasional return to Palais Herberstein, though none of those initiatives could match the history and reputation of the first caf\u00e9.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today, you can still buy coffee at the address but only in the supermarket that arrived there in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How to get to Palais Herberstein<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Just follow the tips at the end of the main <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/sights\/michaelerplatz-2\/\">Michaelerplatz<\/a> article.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Address: Herrengasse 1-3, 1010 Vienna<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/maps\/d\/u\/0\/embed?mid=1asmHlbVpicbQLt1557vf6l4l0zQ\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Michaelerplatz square has its fair share of buildings rich in history and one example is Palais Herberstein. Though this proud townhouse might be more famous for its predecessor. A Caf\u00e9 trumps a Palais (Once a haunt of famous writers) The Herberstein aristocratic family owned huge swathes of the province of Styria. Back in the mid-19th [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27426,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-27423","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-winter-palace","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27423"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27423\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83815,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27423\/revisions\/83815"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visitingvienna.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}