Hotel Metropole, Vienna, Palace hotel in Innere Stadt, Austria
Hotel Metropole at Franz-Josefs-Kai 31-33 was a six-story building with neoclassical architecture designed by Carl Schumann and Ludwig Tischler in 1873. The structure combined elegant facades with spacious interiors typical of upscale hotels of that era.
The building was converted into Vienna's Gestapo headquarters in 1942 and served as an administrative and interrogation center. It was destroyed by bombing in 1945 and was not rebuilt afterward.
The name reflects the cosmopolitan spirit of the original luxury hotel, which served as a gathering place for travelers and business people in the 19th century. Today, a memorial at this location shows how the city engages with its past and remembers what happened here.
A memorial center is located at Salztorgasse and can be visited by advance request, offering information about the Nazi period. The site is easy to find, situated near the Danube Canal in the historic city center.
The cellar areas beneath the original building contained prison cells where detainees were held before being deported to concentration camps. Though these underground spaces are no longer visible, their history is preserved through the memorial center.
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