Vienna's Schönbrunn Palace: Imperial Splendour

Our first morning in Vienna, Austria, my husband and I were booked by his company to tour the majestic Schönbrunn Palace. The tour promised to expose us to the "Imperial Splendour" that Austria, and Vienna in particular, is famous for.

(The day's agenda was literally titled "Imperial Splendour" so that there would be no mistaking what we were about the experience that morning!)

The incredible Schönbrunn Palace is well-worth a visit if you are ever in Vienna. It is so impressive that it has made it onto the UNESCO World Heritage Site list of attractions, and sees up to 8 million visitors a year - so don't expect to be puttering around the grounds alone! However, just because Schönbrunn Palace is busy does not mean you should skip seeing it.

Viennese apartment complexes just beyond the Schönbrunn walls.

Today, the palace is within city limits, although not exactly in the historic downtown region. When you arrive at the Schönbrunn, you will see that it is surrounded by apartment complexes and commercial buildings. But it was not always this way.

From humble hunting lodge roots, the Schönbrunn has grown into a giant palace complex.

Schönbrunn Palace actually began as a humble hunting lodge, which happened to have on its grounds a very handy fresh-water spring that procured delicious drinking water. From the name Schöner Brunnen, German for "fair spring", the name Schönbrunn was derived. In 1569, the lodge came into the possession of Maximilian II of the Hapsburg royal dynasty, and from that point on became destined for greatness.

Originally the lodge was just an estate house with a stable and a watermill, and remained that way for generations as the Hapsburg family mainly used the grounds for hunting. It wasn't until 1743, when Empress Maria Theresa gained ownership of the lodge and made it her summer palace, that its true transformation into one of Europe's most impressive Baroque palaces began.

Joey and I in the courtyard at the front entrance to the palace.

Maria Theresa lived at the Schönbrunn all summer, so naturally the court gravitated there, and the palace went from a lonely, remote lodge to the centre of court and political life. Today, Maria Theresa's influence can be found all over the palace, as it was her pride and joy.

Flash forward to the day we visited. The Schönbrunn Palace is a gigantic complex with 1,141 rooms, but tourists and guests are only able to see 40 on the Grand Tour. The complex also includes an impressive garden with a 'Gloriette' (more on that later), a zoo, a hedge maze, greenhouses, a Palm House, several restaurants, a carriage museum (which I'll share in a later post), a theatre and more.

The golden tone of Schönbrunn Palace is actually quite famous, known as Schönbrunn yellow!

Our "Imperial Splendour" tour provided us access to the carriage museum, a walk through the State rooms, a stroll through the gardens, and lunch at one of the restaurants. We were scheduled to spend the entire morning and the early part of our afternoon just navigating this massive complex. If you are planning on going to the Schönbrunn Palace yourself, please remember to give yourself LOTS of time to explore! We didn't even get to the Gloriette, greenhouses, hedge maze, Palm House, or zoo after spending hours there. I'd love to go back to see all of the things we had to miss out on!

The Palm House, which we didn't get to see. Photo from Pexels.

Visitors must buy their ticket at the Visitors Centre near the front gate, and tours are grouped by time slot to prevent the State rooms from getting too crowded and claustrophobic. Our interior tour was slated for later in the morning, so our guide took us first to the carriage museum to have a history lesson on the Hapsburgs and their royal way of life. (To be continued in a later post!)

In one of the beautiful garden tunnels in the Schönbrunn gardens

The carriage museum was very interesting, and gave us a taste of the opulence we might experience within the actual palace walls. When we completed our museum tour, we took a stroll through the lower part of the Schönbrunn gardens. These are free to visit, if you'd like to just tour the grounds instead of going inside, but that seems a little silly to me. If you are there, you may as well see as much as you can!

Divided into separate gardens, the garden grounds span over 2 square kilometers. The main garden is called the Crown Prince Garden, divided into eight beautifully manicured pieces with a wide walkway down the middle, called the Great Parterre. With the beautiful Schönbrunn Palace at one end, and the impressive Gloriette and Neptune Fountain at the other, the Crown Prince Garden is an impressive sight.

The Crown Prince Garden with the beautiful Gloriette at the end

We enjoyed strolling through the Crown Prince Garden and taking photos down the length of the Great Parterre, but sadly did not have enough time in our schedule to go all the way down to the Neptune Fountain or the Gloriette. This is where all of the iconic photos of the Schönbrunn Palace and its gardens are usually taken, so I was a little sad to miss out.

There were hundreds of statues in the gardens to enjoy

After our truncated tour of the gardens, we headed inside for our scheduled stroll through the State Rooms. There were no photos or videos allowed inside the palace, which nearly destroyed me. I tried to take it all in mentally, but really felt like I was suffocating by not being able to share my experience with the world!

You begin the tour at the Blue Staircase, which is where all cameras and phones must be tucked away. Following a pathway of ropes and carpets, visitors are led through the 40 available rooms, learning the history of the Hapsburg dynasty as they are shuttled along. Our tour guide was cheeky and extremely knowledgeable, a good combination. Her stories were smoothly told, with lots of little quips and jokes thrown in to make us chuckle and stay attentive.

One of the State rooms, elegantly decorated. Photo by João Gustavo Rezende from Pexels

One of the most impressive things about the State rooms was the fact that the rooms were all decorated individually, with 'themes' that were very detailed and thorough. Each theme was done to the max, no holds barred.

My favourite State room was the shiny and black Vieux Laque Room, created as a memorial room to Franz Stephen by his wife Maria Theresa. Its shiny, dark laquered panels made the room extremely dramatic.

Within these 40 State rooms, many treasures and beauties lie - you just have to go there yourself to see them!

My second favourite room was the Porcelain room. Since porcelain was all the rage during Maria Theresa's reign, and very expensive, it would have been quite prestigious to have a room all decorated with porcelain. There are 'porcelain' frames, adornments, and details all over the room, but the tour guide let us in on a little secret: most of the pieces in the room were wooden and just painted to look like porcelain! If you want to see for yourself, you can take a virtual tour of the State rooms at the Schönbrunn Palace website, since I wasn't able to take my own photos.

The Schönbrunn Palace reminded me a LOT of the palace of Versailles in Paris in so many ways: the way each room was basically connected by a giant hallway, with visitors just moving from one part to the next; the luxurious manner in which the rooms were decorated, right down to the themes, artwork, and frescoes; even the style of art and furniture was reminiscent of Versailles. While I do have to admit that Versailles was more impressive and refined, Schönbrunn Palace definitely had its own brand of splendour.

The palace is full of imperial splendour, so our tour title was very accurate!

Our tour lasted for about an hour, and then we were shuffled through the gift shop (of course) and out the doors we had entered through. I had to pick up my purse at the coat check as large bags and backpacks are not permitted inside the palace, but luckily coat check is free. (Quite frankly, I was happy to have left my heavy purse behind for the duration of the tour.)

We had a few moments to enjoy the front facade of the Schönbrunn Palace before leaving for lunch. I particularly enjoyed the front staircase, leading up to a beautiful balcony. My poor husband was forced to pose for many photographs with me!

The beautiful staircase at the front of the Schönbrunn Palace 

Lunch was also on the grounds of Schönbrunn Palace, down past the greenhouses and Orangery. We enjoyed some traditional Austrian cuisine, along with a nice glass of wine and a strong European coffee.

Our morning at the Schönbrunn Palace and grounds was lovely. I could have honestly used a couple more hours to fully explore everything - I had really wanted to see the Palm House and the Gloriette. If I ever find myself back in Vienna, I will make a point to revisit the Schönbrunn Palace and do the full tour!