Most visitors walk past it. The Augustinian Church is built into the Hofburg on Josefsplatz, next to the State Hall of the library, and from the outside it's a plain Gothic front squeezed between palace wings. It was the Habsburg court's parish church from 1634 to 1918, and it's…
Plenty of palaces have a library. The Hofburg has a library hall nearly 80 metres long, all shelving, galleries and painted ceiling, built so an…
Walk to the middle of the State Hall of the Austrian National Library and you're standing in front of the man who paid for it. Emperor Charles VI…
Under the dome of the State Hall, around the marble emperor in the middle, stand four big globes. Most visitors give them a glance on the way to the…
Josefsplatz is one of the most complete Baroque squares in Vienna: the white front of the court library on one side, palace wings on two more, and in…
Most people on Josefsplatz look at the bronze emperor on his horse, then at the doors of the State Hall, and go in. Very few look up. They should. On…
