First full day in Vienna The day started out with the entire group meeting for the first time in the lobby of our housing complex. We headed toward our classroom, which is the Austro-American Institute. This building was from the 1890s and is right across the street from the famed Operstaat. It’s amazing that we have an opportunity to look right outside the window of our classroom and see such rich history and beautiful architecture. The Austro-American institute was originally created for cultural exchanges in Austria and was created and endorsed by many famous Austrians, such as: Strauss and Freud’s daughter. Nowadays it is used predominantly as a center for learning English for Austrians of all ages, even many companies send their employees here to learn English in order to internationalize their companies’ customers. In the summer it is mainly used as a classroom for foreign exchange programs, like ours. There are many notable landmarks just a couple blocks from our classroom, including the Albertina, Hofburg, and a memorial for 600 Austrians who died during a WWII bombing of an apartment complex.
The Hofburg is the palace of the Hapsburgs. The Hapsburgs family ruled the region from 1278-1918. The Hapsburgs finally ended their rule in 1918 due to the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of WWI. However, their legacy lives through their incredible palace. The enormity of the palace is due to the fact that each generation of Hapsburgs would build another addition to the palace. Furthermore, each generation would build the new section based off of the popular architectural style of the period, so the entire Hofburg is a collection of buildings in many different styles from Renaissance to Baroque to Neoclassical. Also many of the styles of the buildings in Vienna are based off of the function of a certain building. For instance if the style was Neo-gothic one can assume the building would be used for some civic affairs. Now many of the buildings of the Hofburg are used as museums housing many of the Hapsburg treasures and a library of important and rare works.