vienna’s volksgarten
Next to the Ringstrasse, Vienna’s famous “ring road” which circles the fashionable central area of the city, you can easily access the Volksgarten. This “ Garden Of The People” is open year-round and in the warmer months it is the home to an expansive garden of roses, many of which are dedicated to families and loved ones. Like many of Vienna’s attractions, the area both within and surrounding the garden is steeped in history. So, whether your motivation to visit this beautiful spot is rooted in a botanical interest, in a quest for the perfect photo opportunity or in a desire to walk in the footsteps of history, we can recommend this place as being well deserving of a visit during your next stopover in Vienna!
When the French emperor entered Vienna in 1809 during the Napoleonic Wars, he engaged in tense negotiations with the Austrian Empire and finally forced a signing of the Peace Treaty of Schönbrunn, at great cost to the Habsburgs in terms of dominion and status. To add insult to injury, Napoleon’s troops caused significant structural damage to some of the city’s fortifications as they left the city. Once the rubble was removed, a sizable clearing remained, which the authorities eventually developed into two parks and the famous Heldenplatz Square. The delightful Volksgarten is one of those parks.
Throughout the first half of the nineteenth century, the area found use as a place for a gentle stroll or a concert visit. Various members of the Strauss family performed in the park, for example, and premiered their new musical compositions in the coffee salon there. Johann Strauss I even named a piece after the location. The park’s music lovers greeted his Volksgarten Quadrille (Op. 157) at a soiree with what one newspaper of the time described as “tumultuous applause”. You can listen to the Volksgarten Quadrille at the following link, while you imagine yourself taking a walk in one of the most colorful rose gardens you might ever experience: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2BsD-442pY
Incidentally, there are approximately three thousand rose bushes within the Volksgarten, and four hundred types of roses are represented there! At one end of the Rose Garden is a popular monument in memory of Austrian poet and writer Franz Grillparzer (1791 – 1872), who once lived in the same house as Ludwig Von Beethoven and even spoke at the composer’s funeral.
In 1823, Swiss-born architect Peter Nobile constructed the neoclassical Theseus Temple, a smaller version of Athen’s Temple of Hephaestus.The original function was to provide a home for a marble sculpture of Theseus battling a centaur which had been purchased by the emperor of the time (the first Emperor of Austria, Franz I). Nowadays this impressive structure hosts an ever-changing series of contemporary art installations, facilitated by Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum.
An extensive memorial to Sisi, or the Empress Elisabeth, was completed in 1907 and includes a tree-lined avenue, fountains, water features and a statue of the monarch herself. Visitors can find it tucked away in a quiet corner of the park; it’s the ideal spot in which to savor a quiet moment of respite during a busy day of exploring Vienna’s sights, to read a book or write in a journal. You can easily access the Volksgarten via public transportation (including the U2 and U3 subway lines and a variety of trams) due to its central location, but it retains an atmosphere of peace and tranquility, even on a busy summer’s afternoon.
