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Beneath the gilt and the whipped cream, Vienna is quietly arguing with itself. Our round-up of the designers, makers, kitchens and coffeehouses reinventing the imperial city on its own terms.
Vienna wears its past like a velvet coat, and it would be too easy to spend a long weekend admiring only the surface: the gilded ceilings, the Klimt gold, the whipped cream and the waltz. But the Vienna we keep returning to is the one that argues with itself. History here is not a museum piece, it is a provocation, and the city is at its most compelling where imperial confidence meets a quieter, sharper contemporary hand. The pleasure of the place is watching the two rub along together: a Secessionist façade above a concept store, a coffeehouse older than most nations serving natural wine and a lighter kind of cake. Consider this a round-up of the people, plates and places worth your attention. If you want the full lay of the land first, start with our Vienna city guide.
Vienna's modern imagination began earlier than most. Otto Wagner insisted that only the practical could be beautiful, and his stations and savings bank still teach that lesson a century on. A generation later, Josef Frank designed Villa Beer, the modernist house reopening in 2026, a building that prized comfort and liveability over spectacle and shaped the textiles he would later make famous. That instinct, for grandeur reinvented rather than preserved in aspic, runs through the city's art spaces too: the basalt-dark mumok and the wider MuseumsQuartier mapped in our Vienna art guide, and the Ankerbrotfabrik, a former bread factory in the tenth district now given over to galleries and studios.
If Vienna has a signature, it is the object made properly. Wittmann has built furniture since 1896 and holds the authorisation to produce Josef Hoffmann's designs, a lineage of precise skills passed down through generations. Mühlbauer has shaped hats by hand for four generations since 1903, turning a family millinery into a label worn worldwide. The impulse continues in a newer key with Glein, Sebastian Leitinger's quietly principled label of organic cotton and vegetable-tanned leather, and with Softcover, the independent magazine and art-book shop where Sebastian Gansrigler makes the case for print you can still hold in your hands.
The table is where the city's playful side shows itself. At Mraz & Sohn, three generations of the Mraz family run a two-Michelin-starred kitchen that treats fine dining as something to enjoy rather than endure. For the counterpoint, Stefanie Herkner, the self-styled Queen of Dumplings, serves organic Hausmannskost at Zur Herknerin, one of the hardest reservations in town. And then there is the coffeehouse, that secular cathedral of marble and smoked mirror. Café Bellaria, the city's oldest, has been reimagined with cherry-red Thonet chairs and a lighter touch, while Die Cafetière keeps things intimate in a revived 1960s roastery on Wipplingerstrasse, all house-roasted beans and toasted sandwiches for the regulars who know it.
When it is time to rest, Hotel Altstadt remains the address for feeling at home in the city, not least since Vienna Design Week director Lilli Hollein turned her hand to room 67, dressing it in Fornasetti wallpaper and pieces by Auböck and Loos. It is Vienna in miniature: history and modern design sharing the same four walls, entirely at ease.
Spend a few days here and the cliché falls away. Vienna is not a city to admire from a distance. It is a city to spar with, and these are the people and places we would send you tofirst.
Vienna rewards travellers who look past the imperial surface. The city pairs its Baroque grandeur with a restless contemporary scene, spanning modernist architecture by Otto Wagner and Josef Frank, heritage makers such as Wittmann and Mühlbauer, two-Michelin-starred dining at Mraz & Sohn, reinvented coffeehouses, and design-led stays like Hotel Altstadt.
What makes Vienna worth visiting beyond the classic sights? The most rewarding Vienna sits where imperial heritage meets a sharp contemporary hand: modernist houses, adaptive-reuse art hubs, independent makers, playful fine dining and reimagined coffeehouses.
Where should design lovers go in Vienna? Seek out Otto Wagner's civic buildings, Josef Frank's Villa Beer, the mumok and MuseumsQuartier, the Ankerbrotfabrik galleries, and craft houses Wittmann, Mühlbauer and Glein.
What are the best restaurants in Vienna? For the full spectrum, book two-Michelin-starred Mraz & Sohn for inventive fine dining and Zur Herknerin for Stefanie Herkner's celebrated organic dumplings and Hausmannskost.
Which Vienna coffeehouses are worth visiting? Café Bellaria, the city's oldest coffeehouse, has been elegantly reimagined, while Die Cafetière offers an intimate, house-roasted alternative in a revived 1960s roastery.
Where should you stay in Vienna? Hotel Altstadt is a design-led boutique hotel, home to a room styled by Vienna Design Week director Lilli Hollein, that feels like living in the city rather than visiting it.
Josef Frank’s Villa Beer reopens in Vienna in 2026 following a careful restoration, offering rare access to one of his most important architectural works and a deeper understanding of the ideas that later shaped his celebrated interiors and textiles for Svenskt Tenn.
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Get the insider news and lowdown on what we've been up to, where we've been, and who we've met along the way. Be the first to discover new places and get the scoop on our favourites.