viennese cafés in bohemian prague 

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Places where social history was written over fragile cups.

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Vienna’s café culture has been recognised as so important a phenomenon that it was included on the UNESCO World Intangible Heritage List in 2011. Yet marble tables, Thonet chairs, discreet booths or newspapers in bent woodholders are equally typical of Prague’s café culture. After all, the Bohemian lands were part of the Habsburg monarchy for three hundred years, and Austrian and Czech culture influenced each other for a long time. Whether you enjoy lively café chatter or quieter moments with a cup of coffee over a book, you’ll find it all in Prague. 

Prague is a metropolis with a mature coffee culture. There are establishments that have elevated coffee making to an art of its own, small cafés withwooden chairs on the pavement, minimalist cafés inarcades where locals stop by on their way home fromwork, fair trade cafés, and hipster and bohemian cafés. In short, everything that belongs to contemporary café culture in Europe today.  

What’s more, Prague has retained those Viennese-style cafés with black-tie waiters, left arm folded behind their back, newspapers in five languages in wicker holders hanging from racks, and desserts created by a pastry chef who boasts three medals from international competitions. The main axis of this world of exquisite taste and unobtrusive refinement inPrague is Národní třída – the most famous Viennese-style cafés in Prague style are concentrated here.   

The most famous was likely the café located on the first floor of the now defunct Brauner House on the corner of Národní and Na Perštýně Streets. It was documented as far back as 1820, when even its name referred directly to the Austrian tradition – Vídeňská kavárna (Vienna Café). Later it was renamed Union and it went down in Czech cultural history under this name. The place it occupied inPrague’s social life is evidenced by an advertisement from1892: 

“Union Café. The gathering place of the most distinguished public, the meeting place of all foreigners. Neatly furnished reading rooms with magazines in all languages. Billiard salon, game rooms completely separated. Open daily from 6 a.m. to 2 a.m.”

In the late 19th and early 20th century, anyone who meant anything in Prague society could be seen at Union Café in the evening.  

All the same, the café’s fame finally faded in the early 1940s. The only remaining memory consists of several large-scale photographs that can be admired in theneo-renaissance building on the opposite side of Národní třída, where Café Louvre has been located since 1902. This café was another mecca of Prague’s café culture in the first half of the 20th century. Spreading over several floors, it featured two billiard rooms with eleven tables, gambling rooms, club rooms, a writing room and a telephone exchange. A salon orchestra played for the guests, there was a cinema, a night bar and a wine cellar in the building. Jan Zrzavý, Franz Werfel, Franz Kafka and Albert Einstein were regular guests. Nowadays, a place like this would probably be called a “creative hub” or “cultural centre”.   

After the communist coup inCzechoslovakia in1948, the café was closed, but shortly after the Velvet Revolution the premises were reconstructed and the legendary café was reopened. It currently occupies thefirst floor and includes a pool room in addition to the regular café operations. If you want to experience true inter-war refinement inPrague, you should not miss a visit to Café Louvre. You can savour a Sacher cake or typical Viennese apple strudel; thecoffee menu includes not only the predictable “Viennese” melange, but also a “Maria Theresa” coffee.  

On the same street, about two hundred metres towards theVltava River, is another iconicPrague venue – Národní kavárna (National Café). It has undergone an interesting identity evolution. It was founded in 1896 as Café Imperial and was truly imperial. The wall was adorned with a portrait of the potentate and officers of the emperor’s army used to come here to play billiards, while Antonín Dvořák, the most famous Czech composer, carefully perused a newspaper in the corner. After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Café Imperial became the National Café, Austrian officers were replaced by Czech artists, and if there was one thing that was not carried forward, it was the Austro-Hungarian, and thereby also Viennese, café tradition. It was the meeting place of the left-wing art association Devětsil and avant-garde architects.  

Just like Café Louvre, the National Café did not survive the communist coup in1948 and, again like Café Louvre, it was restored after 1989. Today, there are chairs made ofbent wood around marble tables and crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceilings. Theoffer includes Viennese coffee and Austrian Grüner Veltliner wine. After years of national, social and class defiance, Viennese refinement has returned to the National Café.  

At the very end of the street, with its entrance facingNárodní třída and views of the Vltava River with the iconic panorama of Hradčany rising in the background, is Slavia Café. Opened in 1882, it is the oldest café on Národní třída, the axis around which Prague’s café culture planet revolves. It is and always has been a place where you could meet leading Czech actors from the National Theatre standing opposite, as well as writers, artists or architects.  

However, unlike its rivals at the National Café and Café Louvre, it was not closed after the communist coup in1948, but continued to operate as a nationalised enterprise even during thegrey years of totalitarianism. It had the opportunity to host personalities such as Gabriel García Márquez and Miloš Forman. Paradoxically, it was atthis showcase of the nationalised café business that dissident intellectuals met after the occupation of Czechoslovakia in1968: Václav Havel, Josef Škvorecký, Bohumil Hrabal and others. Today, it is once again a classy establishment withround tables and chairs ofbent wood, and discreet waiters and waitresses moving silently over red carpets. Slavia is yet again spreading not only the fame of Czech artists and intellectuals of three centuries, but also the legacy of Viennese café culture.  

Other Prague establishments of a similar nature certainly include Obecní dům (the Municipal House), Café Imperial and Grand Café Orient. These too will take you back to a world we may sometimes miss in today’s volatile rush and practicality. 

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