Page 32 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide 2016 - Austria

30  INTRODUCING A USTRIA

The Architecture of Austria
Cupolas crowned
Since the Middle Ages, Austria has been at the forefront with openwork
lanterns, inspired
in the development of architecture. Particularly typical of by Renaissance
the Austrian architectural landscape are the vast abbeys domes in Italy.
built in medieval times and modernized during the late
Baroque period, as well as the multi-storey town palaces
and large country residences built for the aristocracy in the
17th and 18th centuries. The late 1800s and early 1900s Pediment
with an early-
marked the birth of modern town architecture, with public Renaissance
buildings such as theatres, banks and government offices. statue of Christ
These and other buildings displayed typical Habsburg-era blessing the
people.
features – monumentality and a distinctly
ornamental character.

Heiligenkreuz Abbey (see p140) was built in the 12th
to 13th centuries, but only the Romanesque church
remains from that period. The abbey itself is a magnificent
Baroque structure erected in the 17th century. The
courtyard has an imposing St Mary’s column.

Schwaz church, dating
from the 15th century
(see p249), with its
opulent star vaulting
resting on slender Windows with
columns, and its interior grab-frames, Statues of saints by
illuminated by vast typical of the early Michael Bernhard Mandl
windows, typifies the Baroque period.
lightness of Baroque
architecture.

The decorative railings
of the famous staircase
at Mirabell Palace in
Salzburg (see p219)
are the masterpiece
of architect Johann
Lukas von Hildebrandt
and sculptor Georg
Raphael Donner.

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