Café Landtmann
The Ringstraße coffeehouse where Sigmund Freud took his coffee — a café built with the boulevard itself, and still the address of Viennese public life.
At a glance
Café Landtmann occupies the ground floor of the Palais Lieben-Auspitz on Vienna’s Ringstraße, between the Burgtheater and the City Hall. Opened in 1873, it grew up with the new boulevard around it and became the coffeehouse of the city’s politicians, thinkers and artists — Sigmund Freud’s regular table among them.
History
Franz Landtmann, from a family of coffeehouse keepers, opened the café on 1 October 1873. Its stretch of the Ringstraße was then a building site: the new City Hall and University were rising directly opposite, and the Burgtheater would soon go up beside it. The café was placed, in effect, at the centre of the new civic Vienna.
In 1881 Landtmann sold the business to the brothers Wilhelm and Rudolf Kerl, who kept the name. Under them it became the preferred coffeehouse of Sigmund Freud, Gustav Mahler, Peter Altenberg, Felix Salten and the composer Emmerich Kálmán. In 1976 the Querfeld family took over and restored it, preserving the richly detailed 1929 interior that guests still sit in today.
What you see
The café keeps its 1929 fitting-out — panelled wood, brass, mirrors and the long banquettes of a Ringstraße coffeehouse — behind the façade of the Palais Lieben-Auspitz.
Its terrace looks straight across the boulevard to the Burgtheater, one of the best café views in the city.
Cultural significance
Landtmann is the coffeehouse of Vienna’s public sphere: less bohemian than the Central, more the haunt of politicians, actors and professors. That Freud chose it as his regular is part of the city’s self-image, and the café is still where Viennese cultural and political life is conducted over coffee.
Key facts
- Opened: 1 October 1873, by Franz Landtmann
- Location: Ringstraße, in the Palais Lieben-Auspitz, by the Burgtheater
- Regulars: Sigmund Freud, Gustav Mahler, Peter Altenberg, Felix Salten
- Interior: the detailed 1929 fitting-out, preserved in the 1976 restoration
- Run by: the Querfeld family since 1976
Practical information & getting there
The café faces the Burgtheater on the Ring. Nearest access: tram lines 1, 71 and D (Rathausplatz / Burgtheater), or U-Bahn Rathaus (line U2). Open daily to all.
Sources & resources
- The Istanbul Chronicle — “Vienna’s Most Elegant Café: Café Landtmann”
- Muvamo — Café Landtmann, Vienna
- Histouring — “Café Landtmann: storia di un’icona viennese sulla Ringstraße”
- Vienna Trips — “Exploring Café Landtmann”
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