Austrian BLISS

By Christina Ohly Evans

With their baroque palaces, grand hotels and storied cultural venues, the Austrian cities of Vienna and Salzburg are perennial favorites for aesthetes and outdoors people alike. With equal parts old-world glamour and cutting-edge art and cuisine, these cities nestled between pristine lakes and mountains
are calling throughout the seasons.

VIENNA

From St. Stephen’s Square to the iconic Schönbrunn Palace to the charming city trams and bustling cafés, the Austrian capital on
the Danube has stayed true to its elegant European roots but is also dynamic, with art galleries and design-led hotels vying for visitors’ attention. Ever a musical mecca— Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner, Haydn,
Mahler, Mozart, Schoenberg, Schubert, Johann Strauss I and Johann Strauss II all called Vienna home—the arts continue to flourish here in all forms, at the world-renowned State Opera and at the Leopold Museum, with its collection of paintings by Egon Schiele and Gustav Klimt. But it is the chance to stroll the city’s endless lush gardens and savor a slice
of Sacher torte—a rich chocolate and apricot jam cake that is a Viennese hallmark—that makes a visit here feel like a step back in time. The pace is just a bit slower here, so linger over a decadent Wiener schnitzel with a glass of local grüner veltliner at one of the city’s Michelin-starred temples of gastronomy or opt for a simple street dog (or bratwurst). When it comes to exploring this magical, verdant city, there is no going wrong.

There is no shortage of sumptuous palace hotels here, so it’s the perfect place to make like a Habsburg and be enveloped in an expansive room brimming with gold and jewel-toned velvets. If it’s a more minimalist vibe you’re after, there are plenty of properties that fit that bill as well. In short, Vienna is a hotel town, and this is only a small handful of the very best.