Tuesday 12 May 2009

Breakfast for the Emperor


Griaß enk!
Welcome!
A welcome in Tyrolean dialect
at the entrance of the beautiful Gastgarten
of the Restaurant Tirolerhof

Red flowers
in a window box

Carved wood porch column
at the outdoor stair landing.

I love how
these blossoms
caress the wood just so.

And this is the view,
from the porch of the restaurant,
built in Tyrolean farmhouse style,
looking down to the 1722 farmhouse
located right in the gardens of
Schönbrunn Palace!

Right here, at this table,
did I savour a perfect Mother's Day breakfast,
accompanied by the cock-a-doodle-doo of
the resident rooster at the farmhouse below
and the finest chorus of birds imaginable!
Particularly enjoyable was the friendly service
all around, and for this alone would I encourage you
to have a meal there.

The Tirolerhof's bucolic setting,
amidst a forest-like area of the palace gardens,
the outdoor dining terrace under tall leafy trees,
and the great food, prepared from
local and even organic ingredients where possible,
make it a really enjoyable Gasthaus experience.

The Tirolerhof entrance to
the famous Schönbrunner Zoo is only steps
away from this Country Inn in the City,
offering you a golden opportunity to work off
the Schnitzel and Apfelstrudel right there!

Or you decide to walk straight ahead,
in south-easterly direction,
where you will see this side-façade rise in front of you:

Schönbrunn's Gloriette!
Standing high on the hill behind Schönbrunn Palace,
the Gloriette with its large high-ceilinged center hall
and arcaded wings, this graceful folly in all
its splendid non-usefulness,
is in my opinion one of the most romantic places
in all of Vienna.

"Built in 1775
as the last building constructed in the garden
according to the plans of Austrian imperial architect
Johann Ferdinand Hetzendorf von Hohenberg
as a 'temple of renown' to serve as both a focal point
and a lookout point for the garden,
it was used as a dining hall and festival hall
as well as a breakfast room for emperor Franz Joseph I
." *)

Where once the Emperor
used to entertain his dinnerguests
or have breakfast in solitude -
lost in thought, following a mallard duck
swimming in the reflection pool, perchance,
or gazing down onto the summer palace and its gardens
and the city beyond -
nowadays we commoners can do the same,
while drinking a cup of coffee or tea,
and eating a slice of apfelstrudel
if we so chose, all in imperial surroundings.



Click on the image
for more views of the city
from the Gloriette!

And so the answer
to the question in my Sunday post
- Where in the City? -
has become clear:
Schönbrunn Palace's Garden
is the location of both the 1722 Tyrolean farmhouse
and the building where emperor Franz Joseph I,
the last ruler of a long line of Habsburg owners,
used to have his solitary breakfast
(see also Morning in the City).

A view of Schönbrunn Palace
and gardens from the Gloriette





gloriette.
Eye-catcher, or pavilion in a garden from which views may be enjoyed, e.g. Hohenburg's Gloriette at Schönbrunn, Vienna (1775).
JAMES STEVENS CURL. "gloriette." A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. Oxford University Press. 2000.
(Retrieved May 12, 2009 from Encyclopedia.com)


Hohenberg, Johann Ferdinand Hetzendorf von
(1732–1816).
Architect of the arcaded Gloriette, the celebrated eye-catcher in the park at Schönbrunn, Vienna (1773–5), an early revival of the Cinquecento style, as well as the ‘Roman Ruin’ (1778), inspired by Piranesi. He redesigned (1772) the landscape garden at Schönbrunn, and is credited with the interior of the theatre at Schönbrunn Palace.
JAMES STEVENS CURL. "Hohenberg, Johann Ferdinand Hetzendorf von." A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. Oxford University Press. 2000.
(Retrieved May 12, 2009 from Encyclopedia.com)

*) Text in cursive, between quotation marks, quoted from Wikipedia.org!

For a map of Schönbrunn, click here, please.

24 comments:

  1. What a glorious place to start one's day! I wonder what was on the breakfast menu? Thank you for the beautiful photos and all of the interesting details.

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  2. Dear readers,
    this killer post took me two days to finish - I kept mixing up pictures and text in the worst ways. ;-)

    Thank you so much to all of you who ventured to guess where the Tyrolean farmhouse is located!

    All the images of this post will lead you to more pictures of the Gloriette and Schönbrunn, just click on them.

    A wonderful Wednesday to all of you,
    Merisi

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  3. I meant killer post in the sense that it almost took me over the edge, not that I think of it as so grand! *smile*

    I swore myself to never again post anything that would force me to follow up with another post, if I got the time or not. ;-)

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  4. BUTTERNUT SQUASH,
    you are welcome! :-)
    The breakfast menu included everything imaginable, from eggs any style to ham, cheeses, fruit salad, müslis, fresh farmer's cheese spreads, jams and honey, even apple strudel and sachertorte, but neither pancakes nor waffles with maple sirup!

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  5. What fabulously revealing pictures and fascinating and interesting supporting commentary.

    I that a Mandarin duck (drake) I spy there on the poool?

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  6. what a wonderful post and the photographs are perfection...one day i will visit vienna and take in all the wonderful sights you share here.
    have a lovely day.

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  7. I agree with everyone else, a simply beautiful post Merisi.

    I think it is a drake Mallard in the pond, with the light catching its head giving the impression of a stripe.

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  8. Wandring Star,
    thank you! :-)

    Oh, the bird in the water?
    I have no idea what kind of duck it is. I wanted to sound knowledgable and called him "Mallard". ;-)

    erin,
    thank you,
    a lovely day to you too! :-)

    Maalie,
    I think I would have noticed if it was a duck different from the usual ones around there - but then again ... ;-)

    Thank you for helping me out here!

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  9. Totaly delightful Merisi. A meal there would be wonderful. I love all the pictures but especially the closeups of the wood and flower details. The blossoms in the windowbox with the shadows just made me say Ahhh.
    You live in an exquisitly beautiful country.

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  10. Ich war vor 3 Jahren dort, den 8. Geburtstag meiner Tochter feiern, deswegen kam es mir bekannt vor. Aber die Arbeit, die du dir gemacht hast ist echt gigantisch! Hut ab! Wundervolle Bilder...

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  11. photowannabe.
    thank you, Sue! :-)
    I consider myself very lucky being able to live here. I truly enjoy every day because around every bend of the road there is something to make my heart jump.

    Bulgariana,
    danke! :-)
    Ich fand keinen kürzeren Weg, den Faden zwischen den zwei so nahen Gebäuden zu ziehen. ;-)

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  12. This is absolutely FAB!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is evident that you put your whole heart into this!!! What a glorious place to spend Mother's Day!!!! Thanks for your wonderful comment Merisi! You are a real friend! This post is awe-inspiring! ~Janine XO

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  13. I have been to Schonbrun and the gardens but your pictures are even more beautiful than the real thing.

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  14. Well I for one appreciate the work you put into it. Magnificent photographs, well worth the trip all by themselves!

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  15. What a wonderful tour! I've been there once, while in college, but it was so hot that day that I found it difficult to enjoy as much as I could have. Now, I really look forward to seeing it again, hopefully on a fine spring day.

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  16. is the food as good as the photos?

    I have to say, everything looks so clean and well cared for. Unlike some palaces in france...

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  17. Thank you again and again for sharing your beautiful city with us. Each picture is a treasure!

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  18. Mein Gott, Wien ist so schoen!
    This is an incredible post. I love every last little bit of it. In the inimitable words of Franz Joseph himself: "es war sehr schoen, es hat uns sehr gefreut".

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  19. Ah, I LOVE your beautiful, peaceful page...so sorry I haven't visited in a bit...I get busy and have to go on blog-fasts, but I always return!

    =)

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  20. Your photography, ideas and perspectives never fail to WOW me. You are so talented.. and wonderful for sharing what you see.. and how you see it.

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  21. I spent one glorious summer in Wien in 1994. I was a student on a Study Abroad program. This particular post brought back lovely memories of a Summer turning to Autumn just as my time there was coming to an end. Love your blog. Thank you!

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  22. Just a Glorious post!
    I've never heard the term gloriette -
    it seems to be similar to a folly; but, a folly isn't always to enjoy a view... .. it's more of a destination.

    What a special breakfast -

    Judith

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  23. Wonderful :) thanks for sharing :)

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  24. A wonderful post of a palace visited once many years ago. Thank you, Merisi, for providing fond memories and history, too.

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