Folded Beauty

Autumn Exhibition
8.9.2010 - 23.1.2011
Press Release June 2010

General Press information

Imperial Furniture Collection
Schloß Schönbrunn Kultur- und Betriebsges.m.b.H.
press information

Coats of Arms Hall

Library from „Villa Nagler“ in Kaltenleutgeben (Mödling, Lower Austria)

The sumptuous villa and farm in the Vienna woods was extensively enlarged in 1883. The owner of the house, Hugo Wittmann, commissioned the architect Eugen Sehnal to add another storey to the villa. The library was designed in a way doing homage to the Austrian monarchy under Emperor Franz Joseph.

The wainscoted room is dominated by framed coats-of-arms of all crown-lands mounted on the ceiling. On the narrow side of the room, the Emperor himself is portrayed in the robes of the Order of the Golden Fleece.

The villa was bought by Johann Nagler (1866-1944), member of the Lower Austrian assembly, in 1910. After the end of the First World War, he commissioned the panels which were mounted above the lintels and are inscribed with pithy remarks of German Chancellor Bismarck and of the German Emperor, which gave the room originally dedicated to the monarchy a Pan-German character.

When plans to demolish the villa became known, the Bundesmobilienverwaltung bought the furnishings of the library, which are a striking example of the exuberant style of the late 19th century.