The Karlskirche

A church with plenty to offer the visitor; Karlskirche (St. Charles’ church) has baroque beauty, classical music, and a rare chance to get up close to the workmanship of the original artisans who painted the dome.

• 18th-century baroque church built by Emperor Charles VI
• Use the panorama lift to view the dome paintings and for views across the city
• Also hosts classical concerts throughout the year
• See also:
  • Book classical concert tickets* in the Karlskirche
  • Karlsplatz Christmas market
  • Vienna churches

St Charles Church

Unlike many of Vienna’s great churches, Karlskirche can be approached from a distance as you walk across the open area before it.

The exterior architecture impresses with its great dome and the two giant columns. The latter’s reliefs and golden imperial eagles offer a clue to the history of the church, which Emperor Charles VI built in the early 18th-century and named after Saint Charles Borromeo.

You need a ticket to enter outside of church needs (the revenue goes toward renovation work). But it’s very much worth doing so.

As you might expect from a baroque place of worship, the inside glows with a smorgasbord of decorative delights…rich in marble stonework, wall paintings, reliefs, statues, scroll work and carvings, with regular splashes of gold. And all in beautiful condition.

Karlskirche is more subtle than some of its over-exuberant colleagues, though, with enough white space to give the senses a rest now and then.

One aspect stands out in particular…

The panorama view

A scaffolded tower off to one side of the dome contains a panorama lift that takes you up to the ceiling for a dual treat.

A few steps up from the top of the lift leads you to a window that looks out across the city to the west (the circular window in the dome in the photo below):

From this height, you see the full glory of the Künstlerhaus and Musikverein buildings off to the side of Karlsplatz, but also catch glimpses of Stephansdom cathedral, the Secession building, the domes of the Kunsthistorisches and Naturhistorisches museums, the Haus des Meeres, the Rathaus, the Votivkirche, and more.

A platform at the top also gets you up close to the plethora of scenes painted across the dome walls. A truly fascinating experience.

First, you now fully appreciate the efforts of those painters. You don’t want to drop your brush from up here (or look down).

Second, a close-up look reveals details you cannot see from below, but also demonstrates how simple strokes that appear clumsily two-dimensional at arm’s length produce marvellous colour and three-dimensional effects when viewed from a distance.

Karlskirche as venue

As with most of Vienna’s great churches, the Karlskirche acoustics lend themselves to classical concerts. For example, the Orchestra 1756 commonly performs Mozart’s Requiem (with a choir, obviously) and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons here.

Expect extra concerts around Advent, too. And the Art Advent Christmas market occupies the park in front of the church (which makes for great photos, with the stalls and a backdrop of a lit-up Karlskirche).

Tickets & visitor tips

On my last visit, a standard adult ticket cost €9.50. I bought my ticket at the entrance, which is around to the right as you face the front of the church.

• Your ticket comes with a colour booklet (available in English) with lovely little explanations of what you’re looking at both inside and outside the building. Particularly useful for understanding what some of those ceiling paintings depict

• As you buy your ticket, look to the right for a plaque commemorating the funeral of Anton Bruckner in the Karlskirche on October 14th, 1896

• Be sure to pop up the spiral staircase immediately after the ticket counter, too, to see the small treasury while there

• For a little architectural bonus, pop across the park to the station pavilions built by Otto Wagner. Not quite Karlskirche in scale, but excellent examples of Jugendstil design

• For those with a love of classical music…
  • The Brahms monument lies just across from the church
  • A small commemorative plaque on the TU Wien entrance diagonally opposite the front of Karlskirche marks the nearby grave of Vivaldi (now buried under the university buildings)

How to get to the Karlskirche

The church is within walking distance of the very centre of town, but might be one of the easiest sites to reach by public transport.

Subway: Karlskirche sits more or less above Karlsplatz subway station, where the U2, U1 and U4 lines intersect. Look for exits to Resselpark.

Tram/bus: numerous trams travel to Karlsplatz or the Karlsplatz/Oper stop, including those that skirt the old town – lines 1, 2, D and 71

Address: Kreuzherrengasse 1, 1040 | Website