Coffee Break

When it's raining and you are fed up of with touring the city or you got too wet, you can take a break in one of Vienna's countless cafés. Since 2011, the traditional Viennese coffee house culture has even belonged to the intangible cultural heritage of UNESCO. If you want to know more about the popular coffee types served in Austria, please click here.

Breakfast at the Café

Here's the breakfast I ate yesterday at the café. Nothing too fancy, but definitely a change to what I normally eat in the morning.

A Morning at the Café

Last week I met a friend in this newly opened café for a late breakfast. The café is located in a former millinery and "Purveyor to the Imperial and Royal Court". 

Café Prückel

The Café Prückel was opened in 1903 under the name "Café Lurion" and quickly got  a popular meeting place. In the 1950s the café was refurbished according to the taste of the time. Since then the furniture hasn't changed, the café still features an intact 1950s design. After all the recent gloomy days the white, red and yellow lights of the café catched my eyes when I passed there Sunday evening.

Café Central - From the Outside

The Café Central, opened in 1876, was a key meeting place of the Viennese intellectual scene in the late 19th century. Adolf Loos, Theodor Herzl and Sigmund Freud were amongst the regulars. Today there are often lines of tourists who want to soak up the historic surroundings at the entrance of the café.

For a Break From the Art

If you need a break from all the artworks at the Kunsthistorisches Museum, you can recover in the café in the beautiful cupola hall. For more photos of the café please click here and here.

Fenster Café

This is Vienna's smallest third wave coffee bar, located in the very city center. The coffee is served only through this window. The speciality of the Fenster Café is the "cornettocino", coffee in an ice-cream cornet.

La Mercerie

Now we are inside the French café where I had breakfast last Saturday. Originally this place was a haberdashery (in French: mercerie), the old, beautiful shelves with the respective signs are still there. The café has no telephone number, no e-mail, address no website, no facebook account - you have to go there and hope that there's a free table. 

French Breakfast

On Saturday I had breakfast with a friend in my favourite French café. I just love everything there!

Saturday Breakfast

On Saturdays and Sundays I love to "celebrate" breakfast and start the day without any hurry. Usually I have breakfast at home, but this photo was taken some months ago in a french café - which explains the baguette and the croissants...

Sitting Outside

During my vacation and last week the weather was rather winterly. It even snowed in the Viennese outskirts! But on Sunday it was finally possible to have a drink outside.

2016 Christmas Illuminations #3

The famous Café Central in the city center is decorated with rather restrained lights.

Take Your Time

I love olive trees, they make me think of my vacations in Southern Europe. Recently I discovered some in front of a Spanish café and deli in the 7th district. I also love the name of this café: "Toma tu tiempo" (= Take your time).

Intergenerational Café

In August I finally was at "Vollpension", an intergenerational café, run by and for the old and the young. Originally the café was only intended as a temporary project in 2012 to create jobs for retirees, but then it was so successful that the operators looked for a permanent location. I found the atmosphere very relaxed, the furniture is a mixture of colours and styles and the customers matched with the furniture (young and old, hip and "normal", several mothers with babies). The cakes are baked directly in the café, and they are delicious!

Espresso

I love the storefront sign of the café refurbished in the style of the 1950s that I mentioned yesterday.

Back in Time

Being obsessed with chairs I just couldn't help taking this picture. I discovered these chairs in front of a café that some years ago was remodeled (almost) back to its old original 1950s outfit. 

February Theme Day: Scene From a Coffee House

Since October 2011 the "Viennese Coffee House Culture" is listed as "Intangible Cultural Heritage" in the Austrian inventory of the "National Agency for the Intangible Cultural Heritage", a part of UNESCO. The Viennese coffee house is described in this inventory as a place "where time and space are consumed, but only the coffee is found on the bill." Austrian writer Stefan Zweig described the Viennese Coffee House as a "sort of democratic club, open to everyone for the price of a cheap cup of coffee, where every guest can sit for hours with this little offering, to talk, write, play cards, receive post, and above all consume an unlimited number of newspapers and journals." Though this gentleman opted for tea, he was completely absorbed in his magazine for quite a while and nobody - not even the waiter - bothered him.
Click here to view thumbnails of all participants in the theme day.

Too Cold to Sit Outside

Until the end of the November the gastronomers are still allowed to put tables and chairs outside, but it's currently too cold to sit outside.

Cafe Restaurant

I love vintage signs and characters, especially from the 1950s and 1960s. Some days ago the neon writing in the entrance area of a long-established café in the city center caught my eyes.

Eat More Cake

This sign welcomes the clients of a café in the 18th district. The slogan of my life... ;-)