Gerngroß Department Store

Alfred Abraham Gerngroß (1844–1908) from Forth near Nuremberg, who had learned the drapers trade from August Herzmansky, who had founded, in 1863, a prominent Viennese drapery.

Then on 26 September 1879, with his younger brother Hugo (1857–1929), Alfred founded his own store on the corner of Mariahilferstrasse 48 and the Kirchengasse.

After a period of competition with his former employer, August Herzmansky, the two companies tried to work together, but this did not prosper, and the collaboration ceased again in 1881.

[2] From 1902 to 1904, the architects, Ferdinand Fellner and Hermann Helmer built a new five-story concrete framed structure on Mariahilfer Strasse.

[4] After the Anschluss in 1938, Paul and his wife Martha Gerngroß (and family) had to flee and emigrated to Montevideo in Uruguay.