Sotheby’s : Spotlight | Vienna 1900: An Imperial and Royal Collection

Sep 13, 2023 | Following the fall of the monarchy in France, Vienna saw its rapid rise as the ultimate Royal and Imperial court in Europe, welcoming royal families from across the continent. The most awe-inspiring splendour and glory in Western court life were in Vienna at that time and this unique Royal and Imperial jewellery collection is both its most faithful witness and its most dazzling representative, offering a once in a lifetime opportunity to acquire historic pieces from a scintillating bygone era.

The collection fascinatingly depicts the grandeur of Viennese court life and affords a wonderful insight into the alliances, the tastes and styles of the Houses of Habsburg, Bourbon Parma, Bourbon-Two Sicillies and Saxe-Coburg-Gotha when they were setting fashion trends at the Court that radiated across Europe from early 19th century and for the next 100 years.

Comprising over 200 pieces, this collection will be offered in as part of the Vienna 1900: An Imperial and Royal Collection across two auctions on 6 and 7 November during Sotheby’s Luxury Week in Geneva.

In association with Philipp Württemburg Art Advisory GmbH.

Apfelstrudel: The Secret Behind How Original Viennese Apple Strudel Is Made | Food Secrets Ep. 10

Apr 28, 2021 Viennese apple strudel is probably the most popular dessert among the many great pastries Austria has to offer. It takes special skills and ingredients to make an original apple strudel by hand. We went to Vienna, Austria to see how an original apple strudel is made.

Viennese apple strudel:

Ingredients for ten people

Dough:

• 210 g plain flour
• 42,5 g table oil
• 95 g lukewarm water
• 2 g salt
• one small egg

Filling

• 1.7 kg tart apples (e.g.: Golden Delicious), cut into flakes
• 25 g lemon juice
• 65 g cinnamon sugar
• 35 g chopped walnuts
• 35 g rum raisins
• 65 g granulated sugar
• a pinch of cinnamon
• some melted butter

Butter crumbs

• 100 g breadcrumbs
• 50 g butter
• 50 g granulated sugar
• 5 g vanilla sugar

Preparation

To make the dough, place the flour in a food processor with the oil, water, a pinch of salt and the egg - if you decided on using one - and process with the dough hook until a smooth dough is formed. Form the dough into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least an hour.

In the meantime, cut the apples into slices and mix them with lemon juice and prepare the butter crumbs.

For the butter crumbs, heat the butter in a saucepan and toast the crumbs in it, sweeten with sugar and vanilla sugar. After resting, sprinkle the dough well with flour and roll it out in an oblong shape with a rolling pin.

Sprinkle a large cloth with flour and stretch the strudel dough as thinly as possible to a size of 60 x 70 cm. (The dough should be so thin that you can read a newspaper through it.) Use the backs of your hands, not your fingers, so as not to poke holes in the dough. Drizzle the dough with melted butter and spread the butter crumbs on a strip of dough. Put the sliced apples on top, then the cinnamon sugar, the walnuts and finally the rum raisins.

With the help of the cloth roll up the dough and put it on a baking tray covered with baking paper and brush it again with melted butter. Bake in the preheated oven at about 200 degrees Celsius for about 30 minutes until golden brown. Let the strudel cool down, cut it open and serve it sprinkled with powdered sugar and a dollop of whipped cream.

Gunmen on Loose in Vienna after String of Terror Attacks

THE GUARDIAN: Two people dead – including one attacker – after string of incidents in Austrian capital

Police in Vienna were hunting for a group of “heavily armed and dangerous” gunmen on Monday night after a string of shootings described by the Austrian chancellor, Sebastian Kurz, as a “repulsive terror attack”.

Two people were killed and 15 others – including at least one police officer – were seriously injured in exchanges of gunfire in the centre of the Austrian capital.

One of those killed was an attacker who was shot dead by police. But several other gunmen were still on the loose on Monday night, and Karl Nehammer, the interior minister, warned that they were “heavily armed and dangerous”.

“We have brought several special forces units together that are now searching for the presumed terrorists. I am therefore not limiting it to an area of Vienna because these are mobile perpetrators,” Nehammer told broadcaster ORF, urging the public to stay indoors until the all-clear was given.

Shootings occurred in a string of incidents at six locations close to Seitenstettengasse street in the heart of the Austrian capital, a spokesperson for Vienna’s police force told ORF. » | Philip Oltermann in Berlin | Monday, November 2, 2020

David Davis's Brexit Speech in Austria - Watch Live

David Davis will tell business leaders in Austria that fears the Conservatives will plunge Britain into a “Mad Max-style world borrowed from dystopian fiction” after leaving the EU are unfounded.

Far-right Has Second Chance in Austria’s Election Re-run

Austria is a country divided, at least as far as the presidential runoff goes. This is a re-run of an election held six months ago and so far the count is too close to call.

The Rise of Vienna's Far Right (2011)

‘All Relevant Actors’ Gather in Vienna for Decisive Syria Talks

Top officials from the US, Russia, Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are gathering in Vienna to seek a solution to the Syrian crisis, with Iran getting a place at the table for the first time. RT's Harry Fear is following the top-level negotiations.

Record Result for Austrian Far-right in 'Red Vienna'

YAHOO! NEWS: Vienna (AFP) - Europe's migrant crisis helped Austria's far-right on Sunday post its best-ever election result in Vienna, although its score was weaker than predicted and the centre-left retained power in its traditional fiefdom.

Fifteen years after the Freedom Party (FPOe) under the late Joerg Haider stunned Europe by entering the federal government, the populist party won 32.3 percent of the vote in the city state, preliminary results showed.

The result for the party now led by Heinz-Christian Strache represented a rise of 6.5 percentage points compared to the last election in Vienna in 2010, when their score soared 11 percentage points.

The Social Democrats (SPOe), which have ruled 1.8-million strong "Red Vienna" uninterrupted since 1945, scored 39.4 percent, down 4.9 points, adding to a similar drop in support in 2010. » | Simon Sturdee | Sunday, October 11, 2015

Vienna Replaces Pedestrian Traffic Light Figures with Gay Couples

A new traffic light, showing a same-sex couple, in Vienna

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: In a gesture to coincide with the city hosting the Eurovision Song Contest, hundreds of pedestrian signals around the Austrian capital will be replaced with new lights showing couples hand in hand

Vienna is preparing to give its pedestrian traffic lights a love life – by replacing the red and green men with couples.

And in a move intended to show the Austrian capital's tolerance and openness, the couples will come in three varieties: straight, gay and lesbian.

Hundreds of the signals around the city will be replaced with new lights showing various different couples hand in hand: a man and a woman, two men, or two women.

To complete the picture they will be adorned with romantic hearts.

The Ampelmännchen, or little traffic signal man, is something of an obssession in the German-speaking world.

Cities in Germany have installed lights featuring red and green women, in an effort to redress the gender imbalance of the traditional signals.

But Vienna has gone a step further, introducing a sexual orientation for the little red and green people. » | Justin Huggler, Berlin | Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Fighting Radical Islam in the West: Geert Wilders’ Speech in Vienna Austria

LIBERTY NEWS ONLINE: Geert Wilders, the leader of the Party for Freedom (Partij voor de Vrijheid, PVV) in the Netherlands paid a visit to Vienna yesterday to meet with Heinz-Christian Strache, his counterpart in the Austrian Freedom Party (Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs, FPÖ). Mr. Wilders delivered a speech at the Hofburg Palace, the former imperial palace of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, to a full house of more than a thousand people. A press conference before the speech was held in the Austrian parliament.

Below is the English translation of the prepared text for the speech given by Mr. Wilders. The original German version is below the jump.

--------------

I am extremely happy to be here, in the Hofburg, together with more than one thousand proud Austrian patriots.

It is a pleasure to visit Heinz-Christian and my friends of the FPÖ again.

It is an honor to be in this beautiful city.

All over the world Vienna is the symbol of resistance against Islam.

It is here that the Islamic invasion of the West was stopped in 1683.

Islam was defeated at the gates of Vienna.

You and I are standing here today inside these gates.

In the city that Islam was unable to conquer.

And today we have a clear message for Islam again.

The same message that King John Sobieski had when he rushed to Vienna in 1683 to help defend it against the Turks: You will not be able to overwhelm Vienna or the West. Because we will not allow it. » | Geert Wilders | Friday, April 04, 2015

Anti-Islamist Pegida Group Holds First March in Austria

Only a few hundred people attended Pegida's first rally in
Vienna, observers say.

BBC AMERICA: The anti-Islamisation movement Pegida, which originated in Germany, has held its first march in Austria.

But while rallies in Germany have often attracted more than 20,000 people in recent weeks, only a few hundred took part in Monday's rally in Vienna.

They found themselves outnumbered by police - and even more so by about 5,000 people who had gathered for a counter-demonstration.

Austria is the latest European country to see anti-Islamisation protests.

Supporters of Pegida gathered in a square in central Vienna's shouting "We are the people", the BBC's Bethany Bell reports.

Some gave Nazi salutes while riot police separated them from rival protesters changing "down with Pegida". » | Monday, February 2015

Isil Jihadists 'Offered Teenager $25,000 to Carry Out Bombings in Vienna'

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: A 14-year-old boy suspected of planning a series of bombings in Vienna reportedly offered $25,000 (£16,000) by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant to carry out attacks

A 14-year-old boy suspected of planning a series of bombings in Vienna was reported on Thursday to have been offered $25,000 (£16,000) by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) to carry out the attacks amid claims that two other youths recruited in the same way remain at large.

The arrested youth has not been named by authorities, but has been identified by the Austrian media as Mertkan G, the son of Turkish immigrants, who has lived in the country for eight years. He was arrested on Tuesday but details are only now emerging about his case.

Among the sites in which he has admitted planning to plant explosives is Vienna's Westbahnhof station, one of the busiest in the country, used by 40,000 travellers each day. » | Justin Huggler, Berlin | Thursday, October 30, 2014

Opera Depicting Atrocities in Austria Debuts
SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST: Many children who fell short of the Nazis’ Aryan ideal were killed alongside other ‘unworthy lives’

Thousands of children were murdered by the Nazis because they fell short of the Aryan ideal. Now, a hushed audience has gathered in Austria’s parliament to watch the world premiere of an opera depicting how the Nazis methodically killed mentally or physically deficient children at a Vienna hospital during the second world war.

The killings were part of a greater campaign that led to the deaths of about 75,000 people – homosexuals, disabled people, or others the Nazis called “unworthy lives” – and served as a prelude to the Holocaust.

Austrians played a huge role in these and other atrocities of the era – nearly 800 children were killed at Vienna’s Spiegelgrund psychiatric ward – and the premiere of the opera Spiegelgrund was the latest instalment of a national effort to atone for such acts in word and deed.

The timing was picked to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day, which will be observed worldwide today, and the performance was streamed live on the internet for international audiences. But the parliamentary venue was chosen for a particularly Austrian reason: as a reminder of how the country’s politicians fomented the atmosphere of intolerance and authoritarianism that allowed Hitler’s troops to walk in in 1938, and a determination to not let history repeat itself. » | Associated press in Vienna | Sunday, January 27, 2013

Europe's Biggest Brothel – Complete with Coach Parking – To Open in Austria
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: An Austrian entrepreneur has announced plans to open Europe's biggest brothel, with a complex boasting a 147 rooms and coach parking.

When opened in 2014 the giant brothel, officially dubbed the "FunMotel", will have capacity for 1,000 "guests" a day with around 150 sex workers employed in the £12 million project. Along with room for buses it will also have 350 parking spaces and a three-metre high perimeter wall to ensure privacy.

Peter Laskaris, the businessman behind the project who already operates a brothel in Vienna, said that the glitzy bordello's "four-star hotel" facilities will be the sex industry's shift from "grocer to supermarket".

The FunMotel will offer "swinger parties, gangbangs" and "porn stars" along with more mundane hotel attractions such as restaurants, beauty salon and gym. But 8Quadrat Developers, the Vienna-based company developing the project, claim that "the number of females" and the "affordable prices" will "ensure absolute satisfaction for male customers".

The brothel will be built at a still undisclosed location in the north-eastern state of Lower Austria, which surrounds the Austrian capital. » | Matthew Day, Warsaw | Monday, November 05, 2012

DER STANDARD: Das Mega-Laufhaus vor den Toren Wiens: Für 15 Millionen Euro planen Wiener Rotlicht-Größen das größte Laufhaus Europas in Niederösterreich. Der genaue Standort ist noch geheim, die Option auf ein Grundstück wurde bereits bezahlt » | Julia Herrnböck | Freitag, 02. November 2012

The Rise of Vienna's Far Right
Examining why former dental hygienist HC Strache, leader of Austria's far right Freedom party, managed to win 27% of the vote in last year's elections in traditionally left-leaning Vienna

Lucija Stojevic | Friday, February 11, 2011
THE GUARDIAN: First Netherlands, then Sweden. Now Austria witnesses rise of far right: 'Red Vienna', a socialist and social democrat stronghold since 1920s, is latest European city to see extremists make new gains >>> Ian Traynor, Europe editor | Monday, October 11, 2010

Iran on Brink of Nuclear Weapon, Warns Watchdog
THE TELEGRAPH: Iran has passed a crucial nuclear threshold, weapons inspectors have warned, and could now go on to arm an atomic missile with relative ease.

Hillary Clinton during the imposition of sanctions. The may be hurting the economy but Iran's weapons programme is continuing. Photo: The Telegraph
A report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Iranian nuclear scientists had made at least 22 kilograms of enriched uranium at least 20 per cent purity, a technical hurdle that is the hardest to overcome on the way to weapons-grade uranium.

Experts estimate that 20 kgs of uranium is the minimum required to arm a warhead. The uranium would still need to have its purity raised to 90 per cent, but that is a relatively easy process.

The agency's report comes in spite of the recent imposition at the United Nations of a fresh round of sanctions against Iran and will heighten fears of an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear plants. The prospect of an attack had receded only recently with American assurances that Tehran was more than a year away from acquiring a bomb.

The Vienna-based nuclear watchdog said Tehran had maintained its absolute defiance of international pressure to curb its programme despite the imposition of harsh sanctions in May. The IAEA has grown increasingly alarmed at Iran's behaviour and the latest report, which will be presented to the agency's governors at a meeting next week, lambasted Tehran on a series of fronts. >>> Damien McElroy, Foreign Affairs Correspondent | Monday, September 06, 2010

While the West dilly-dorks and faffs around with sanctions which will never have the desired effect, Iran continues with its nuclear programme. When the Iranians will have the bomb, and will be able to threaten Israel and Europe, it will be too late. And all this is taking place on Hussein Obama's watch. Sanctions won't work against the mullahs of Iran, no more than they'd have worked against Hitler and Nazi Germany. Find your backbone and deal with the matter. Get with the story! – © Mark

John Paul ‘Ignored Abuse of 2,000 Boys’
Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer abused an estimated 2,000 boys for decades without sanction. Photo: The Sunday Times
THE SUNDAY TIMES: When John Paul II died five years ago the crowd that packed St Peter’s Square for his funeral clamoured “Santo subito (Saint now)!” in a spontaneous tribute to the charisma of the Polish pontiff.

As the faithful marked the anniversary of John Paul’s death on Good Friday, however, he was being drawn into the scandal over child abuse in the Catholic church that has confronted his successor, Benedict XVI, with the worst crisis of his reign.

Allegations that the late pontiff blocked an inquiry into a paedophile cardinal, promoted senior church figures despite accusations that they had molested boys and covered up innumerable cases of abuse during his 26-year papacy have cast a cloud over his path to sainthood.

The most serious claims related to Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer, an Austrian friend of John Paul’s who abused an estimated 2,000 boys over decades but never faced any sanction from Rome.

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Groer’s successor, criticised the handling of that scandal and other abuse cases last week after holding a special service in St Stephen’s cathedral, Vienna, entitled “Admitting our guilt”.

Schönborn condemned the “sinful structures” within the church and the patterns of “silencing” victims and “looking away”.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — who became Pope Benedict — had tried to investigate the abuses as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, according to Schönborn. But his efforts had been blocked by “the Vatican”, an apparent reference to John Paul. >>> Bojan Pancevski in Vienna and John Follain in Rome | Easter Sunday, April 04, 2010

Cardinal Schönborn Says Celibacy Partly to Blame for Clerical Sex Abuse
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn is seen as a future candidate for the papacy. Photo: Times Online
TIMES ONLINE: A cardinal seen as a future candidate for the papacy has broken a Vatican taboo by raising the possibility that priestly celibacy is among the causes of the sex abuse scandal sweeping the Roman Catholic Church.

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, the Archbishop of Vienna and a protégé of Pope Benedict XVI, wrote in his archdiocese's magazine this week that the Church must make an "unflinching examination" of the causes of the scandal.

He said that these included "the issue of priests' training, as well as the question of what happened in the so-called sexual revolution of the generation of 1968".

He added: "It also includes the question of priest celibacy and the question of personality development. It requires a great deal of honesty, both on the part of the Church and of society as a whole." >>> Richard Owen in Rome | Thursday, March 11, 2010

Colonel Tells of Lavish Shopping for N Korea Dictators
BBC: A former North Korean colonel, Kim Jong-ryul, has described how he spent two decades shopping in Europe for the dictatorship in Pyongyang.

His story is the subject of a new book published in Austria, where the colonel says he has lived under cover since his defection in 1994.

Colonel Kim Jong-ryul says he spent 20 years doing business in Europe for the North Korean regime.

His story is told in a new book, At the Dictator's Service. >>> Bethany Bell, BBC News, Vienna | Monday, March 08, 2010

Right-wing Outcry After Temple Death
WIENER ZEITUNG: Stadler calls for border checks and more police officers. / Two houses raided by Vienna police.

Vienna. The reaction of Austria’s right-wing parties to the shooting at a Sikh temple in Vienna has caused fury from Social Democrats.

Ewald Stadler, European Parliament (EP) election front-runner for the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ) said today (Mon) "problem gurus and hate preachers” should not be allowed into the country. Stadler called for the re-introduction of border checks between Austria and Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic respectively, suggesting similar restrictions on the borders to Italy and Germany could also be an option.

Stadler repeated his calls for more police officers and called for an increase in subsidies for institutions who secure interior safety.

FPÖ boss Heinz-Christian Strache claimed the "policy of open doors" of the Social Democrats would "lead into chaos and multicultural crime”.

Vienna SPÖ Integration Councillor Sandra Frauenberger said it was "disgraceful” Strache was now thinking of nothing else than "acting as a hate preacher who incites people against each other”. >>> By Thomas Hochwarter | From Tuesday’s printed edition, May 26, 2009