Michaelerplatz

Michaelerplatz in Vienna is a baroque star square in the city center that was created around 1725 but did not open until the end of the nineteenth century.

The plaza has had its name since around 1850, after Babenberg Duke Leopold VI. gave the parish church of St. Michael for the court staff and residents who resided near the Hofburg.The square, which had been exceedingly uneven for generations, was rebuilt around 1725 for the Michaelertrakt of the Hofburg by Joseph Emanuel Fischer von Erlach.Although building on the left wing began in 1729, it stalled during Emperor Charles VI’s final years in power.Maria Theresa recruited to the theater at the rededication of the Ballhaus in 1741.The baroque intentions were not implemented for another 150 years, especially between 1889 and 1893 by Ferdinand Kirschner in connection with the destruction of the ancient Burgtheater in the plaza.

The first public gas lighting in Vienna was established on Michaelerplatz in the fall of 1838.Georg Pfendler, the founder and director of the “Austrian Society for Lighting with Gas”, built a gas candelabra with six flames on the square.The gas arrived through a pipeline from the Roßau gas facilities.Michaelerplatz became Vienna’s first roundabout in 1927.

Around Michaelerplatz are a number of noteworthy structures.In addition to the above-mentioned Michaelertrakt of the Hofburg (Michaelerplatz 1, with a dome over the passage to the Burgtor), which was designed as a dominant feature of the Kohlmarkt’s visual axis, the Looshaus (Michaelerplatz 3) is particularly noteworthy (Michaelerplatz 3).The so-called Palais Herberstein (Michaelerplatz 2), a neo-baroque tenement palace built in place of the former Palais Dietrichstein-Herberstein, attempts to emulate the Michaelertrakt’s design.The Michaelerkirche is one of Vienna’s most historically and culturally significant church structures.Historically assigned to it are the Large Michaelerhaus (Michaelerplatz 4), built by the Barnabites in 1720 by Giovanni Battista Maderna, and the Small Michaelerhaus (Michaelerplatz 6), built in 1732, on the ground floor of which the “Michaeler Bierhaus” was located from 1749 for more than two centuries.The chapel in the middle is numbered 5.

Since 1991, the core of Michaelerplatz has been characterized by archaeological excavations that have been framed by the architect Hans Hollein and are permanently available to the public as a section of the Wien Museum.