Living a kosher life also means living within walking distance of shops selling everyday items and the closest synagogue. This is why Jews have organized their lives for centuries in densely structured urban settings – such as Vienna’s Leopoldstadt! There is nowhere in Austria where one finds so many members of the Jewish faith or such clear evidence of Jewish life as this district. To mark the VIENNA DESIGN WEEK, the architect and elected Board Member of the Jewish Community of Vienna (IKG) Natalie Neubauer-Muzicant guides visitors to some of the district’s key locations: The tour begins in Tempelgasse, in which the Leopoldstädt Temple stood until its destruction during the November pogrom in 1938. Today it is home to two of the community’s key institutions, the first Sephardic Center after the Shoa and the psychosocial facility ESRA. Visitors then continue to Zirkusgasse 22, the former location of the so-called Turkish Temple, and Lilienbrunngasse, where they can find a kosher bakery, a supermarket, several secluded strictly orthodox prayer rooms, and, during the festival, a temporary sukkah that has been erected to mark Sukkot, the most important celebration of the Jewish calendar. The tour ends in the SAM, a new private museum designed by KENH Architekten, which houses Jewish objects (Judaica) and archives as well as a parochet (a Torah curtain) from the destroyed Turkish Temple, which was long thought to have disappeared.q

A binding reservation must be made in advance at viennadesignweek.at/booking

Please be at the meeting point 15 minutes before the start of the tour.

A photo ID is required to enter the Sephardic Center and the Sammlung Ariel Muzicant. The ID must be carried on the tour, a copy must be sent in advance to oa@ikg-wien.at with the subject “VIENNA DESIGN WEEK”. Weapons such as pocket knives, pepper spray, or the like are not allowed to be brought on the tour.

Language: German, English upon request

Tickets: Adults € 12,
Students € 10, up to 18 years € 7,
Children under 6 and Kulturpass free

Maximum 25 people