Otto Wagner was the leading architect of Vienna’s version of Art Nouveau, Jugendstil, and his buildings and influence can be seen all over Vienna. But it’s likely that the one most familiar to most people is the subway station at Karlsplatz, an easily recognizable icon of Vienna itself.
Built in 1898, it’s still an active station, as you can see from the travelers entering the stairway at the left above. But the building itself no longer has a transit function; instead, one of its two identical pavilions houses a cafe and the other a small museum that serves as an introduction to Wagner and to the station itself.
The station’s outward appearance hasn’t changed much since the drawing below, from the opening day celebration, but that almost wasn’t the case. When Vienna was adding new transit lines and a major transfer point at Karlsplatz in the 1970s, Wagner’s pavilions were slated for destruction. As might be expected, there was a major outcry, and they were shifted slightly instead.
Incidentally, a significant part of the decorative work on the station was done by the chief illustrator in Wagner’s architecture practice, Joseph Maria Olbrich, who went on to design one of Vienna’s other Art Nouveau icons, the Secession Building.
