Wien Wohnung
Unfortunately not my apartment in Vienna … but what a great decor, right? And how nice I had the chance to see it with my own eyes AND I was allowed to take some photos and share them with you on The Viennese Girl blog. Could be the deco of a small design boutique hotel, but nope..it’s a private apartment in Vienna!
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If you’d like to have an excellent coffee in a stylish café, Balthasar is the place for you. Its spacious, minimalist interior offers five round tables at the windows, at which one can work or chat unbothered by the other guests. When they’re taken, no need to worry – there are still seats at the communal tables! And in the summer you can also sit outside or order a take-away coffee and go for a walk at the nearby Danube Canal. Don’t forget to try their pastries, though. They are finger-licking good!
Supersense was opened as a small café in an analog concept store and has been expanding ever since. No wonder, as it stuns its visitors from the very moment they open the velvet curtain at the entrance. High ceilings with golden, floral ornaments and huge palace windows remind of the old times while the interior design is a mixture of the last few decades and the most modern style. It’s easy to notice the love to detail, especially when it comes to coffee – it’s served on a wooden plate, accompanied by a glass of water with a colorful bottom. For the hungry ones, there’s also a selection of breakfast and lunch options. Supersense’s atmosphere is truly exceptional and should be on any coffee lover’s list.
If there’s any ultimate Neubau place, it’s Burggasse 24. Every piece of furniture in this cozy café in the back of a second-hand shop is different, yet goes well with its artsy vibe and laid-back atmosphere. Here, you can sit on one of the colorful couches or chairs, sip on a great cup of coffee and look at the fireplace; or at yourself, as there are mirrors on every wall. The omnipresent abundance of plants completes the picture. Apart from coffee, breakfast and drinks are served. A true hygge experience in Vienna.
Text by Kasia Makusz
Photos by me
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This is not my typical blog post. It’s not a travel-oriented one. Rather, it has to do with a great experience that I had last week in Vienna.
First of all, let me tell you this: I never had the need for a car in Vienna because I travel so much. I am not in Vienna very often, and when I am, I work from home and I walk a lot. Turns out, I don’t know a lot about the car industry. For this reason, I was very excited at the opportunity to attend the Vienna Design District event last week in collaboration with Mazda Austria. This experience gave me an insight into the car industry and allowed me to learn more about their Kodo Design Philosophy and about the process of overcoming the challenges Kodo poses to the designers and the clay modellers. Kodo means “soul of motion”. Kodo aims to capture energy in motion, even when standing still, infusing the vitality of living creatures into products that are exciting and inspiring, yet also warm and inviting.
I spent the entire day with the team of Mazda Austria and their guests. We kicked off the experience with a briefing of the topic “How Mazda designs”. The event took place in Saal der Laabstelle and all the guests were introduced to clay. Clay is for Mazda the perfect material to convey the emotion and detail that Mazda wants to put into the surfaces of its vehicles. A clay modeller said a few words about his work and I had the chance to be, with his help, a clay modeller for a moment.
What I took with me from this experience was that I realized how much work goes behind creating a car. It all begins with a vision and a philosophy and it is followed by intense debate between the clay modellers and the exterior designers until the design is finalized down to the last detail. The craftsmanship consists of four steps: design with clay, create with metal, perfect with paint and finesse the fabrications.
Later on, we all had lunch at the Laabstelle restaurant, followed by an Insta-Walk through Vienna’s first district. Afterwards, we had an Insta-Drive with the new Mazda3. All the photos that you see in this blog post were taken during that day.
We ended the day at the Vienna Design District event, which took place at Hofburg. The Vienna Design District event was a three day event and it was the biggest Design-Event of the year. Hofburg was transformed into a huge showroom where local and international brands presented designs, each one from a different perspective. It’s no wonder why Vienna remains the world’s most live-able city and it has also been elected as the world’s smartest city this year.
I was very happy to be a guest of Mazda Austria. Thank you for having me!
More on Instagram!
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Disclaimer: In collaboration with Mazda Austria
I wanted to go the Vienna Opera Ball this year but I didn’t dare to think that it could actually happen. In fact, when I received the invitation from Swarovski, I couldn’t believe my own eyes. I had to check my mobile twice to convince myself that my wish did come true.
Not only was I happy for me to attend the Vienna Opera Ball with Swarovski, but I was also happy for my Instagram friends and readers. I knew that they would love to see my photos from the the Opera Ball on my social media channels. How do I know this? I have this impression from back in 2016 when I attended the Vienna Opera Ball for the very first time.
In the first part, we have photos that were shot at The Guesthouse Hotel, where I had my makeup and hair done by a professional team of hair dressers and makeup artists.
As you can tell from the photos, I love product photography. When I have beautiful products in front of me, I feel the need to photograph them. I can spend hours doing so, playing with the light and with different compositions. In this case, my beautiful products were my jewelry pieces from Swarovski and the cutest little bag from Dolce & Gabbana. I chose to wear them for this special night.
In the second part, we have two shots from the gala dinner. The dinner took place at the Sacher hotel. The blog post ends with photos that are shot in the Opera House, one day before the ball, during the official final rehearsal.
It was quite challenging to cover photographically all those amazing happenings that occured one after the other: the rehearsal on Wednesday, the preparation before the ball, the gala dinner, the Opera Ball on Thursday 8th of February.
But believe me, if I have the chance again, I would do the same thing all over. It made me feel alive, honored, and blessed to have been given this opportunity to attend the Vienna Opera Ball with Swarovski, and to have been chosen by the Dolce & Gabbana family in Milano to wear this dreamy evening gown. Grazie tante!
Each detail was so perfectly organized by the people involved. Everything from the correspondence I had with the person who was behind the entire organization, to the fitting at the Dolce & Gabbana boutique in the first district, to taking photos with the girls on the red carpet, to the moment I was dancing Quadrille together with Michaela from Elastyle.
I was very lucky to have advance access to the Opera House, in order to take my photos before they let people in!
The funniest thing about that night was when I discovered the disco room in the basement of the opera! I’ve been to the Vienna Opera House many times before. I didn’t know that a room in the basement could ever be transformed into such a fun disco dance hall.
There is always something new to discover in Vienna…
Nothing but A BIG THANK YOU to the SWAROVSKI famliy for having me as one of their guests!
Jewelry: Swarovski
Outfit: Dolce&Gabbana
Locations: The Guesthouse Hotel, Hotel Sacher, Vienna State Opera
Photos of me in the Opera House: Franco Federici
More on Instagram
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Ball: Ball der Wiener Sängerknaben / Video: Lorin Canaj / Dresses: Peek&Cloppenburg
Hair: B.lounge Vienna / Jewellery: Pour Toi Jewelry
Guest stars: Anastacia Kay & Lilia Briukh
Vienna Ball season – I have some great news. First of all, travelling starts over again for TVG (=The Viennese Girl). I am leaving for Italy tomorrow together with Anastacia for one week. This is the first press trip for the year 2017. It is organised by ENIT-Italia. Check out our Instagram channels for daily updates. And the second good news is that Lorin from Canaj Visuals did one more amazing video for The Viennese Girl blog and I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as we did filming it.
Thanks to the invitation from the Ball der Wiener Sängerknaben, who gave us the opportunity to attend their Ball and create this beautiful video. It was also an opportunity to get together, talk, laugh, dance and forget all the rest…for a night! What do you think about the choice of the music?
Lorin initially had the idea to go for a classical Mozart song, but I thought that we should give to the ball a more young modern touch, and so we went for the song,“Falling”, from Secrets in Stereo. In general, I never thought that The Viennese Girl would ever have videos. But look how things turned out! Unexpectedly good! Fairy tale styling hair was from my all time favourite hair salon B.lounge Vienna, and my pink pastel dress was from Peek&Cloppenburg. Hope you like it and you get the chance to visit a ball during the Vienna Ball season.
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