Klimt Villa

According to the current state of research, it seems likely that the painter Felix Albrecht Harta, who was a friend of Klimt and also of the family who owned the property, the furniture manufacturer Josef Hermann, recommended that he rent the simple one-storey country house with high windows (according to Arthur Roessler) as a studio.

[5] In 1922, the culturally interested Hermann family (involved, among other things, with Harta in the founding process of the Salzburg Festival) began building a villa around the preserved walls of Klimt's last place of work, but apparently had to interrupt it for economic reasons.

She had the villa completed as a two-storey neo-baroque building with a flight of steps in the "Rosenkavalier style", which was widespread among the K.u.k.-nostalgic (especially Jewish) upper middle classes at the time.

In 2007, the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere under its new director Agnes Husslein took over the area for museum use at the invitation of the Wirtschaftsministerium, but refrained from taking care of the villa in 2008, as its plans to return it to the state of construction during Klimt's lifetime were not accepted.

[9] In March 2008, the decision of the Ministry of Economics against the Belvedere's preferred project and in favour of the preservation of the villa and its careful restoration to the state of construction at the time of its erection in 1923 with a flat roof was ultimately based on considerations of monument protection.

[10] In 2008, the Ministry of Economy transferred the fruitful enjoyment of the property to the Kuratorium für künstlerische und heilende Pädagogik (Comenius Institute, President Elisabeth Rössel-Majdan) with the condition that the former Gustav Klimt studio rooms be made accessible to the public as a memorial.

The reconstruction of the furnishings was based on photographs by Moriz Nähr from 1918, descriptions handed down by Egon Schiele and Kijiro Ohta, and existing original samples of objects.

In the front area is the reception room with furnishings based on designs by Josef Hoffmann, which were originally produced by the Wiener Werkstätte (reconstruction of table and chairs: HTL Mödling [de], carpet: Joh.