The Kirche St. Leopold is an extraordinary monument, which sits high atop the Baumgartner Hohe at the city outskirts. Locals people jokingly say to this splendid site as ‘Mount Lemon‘, because of the church’s shining gilded dome that beckons from afar. This new masterpiece was built by architect Otto Wagner from 1903–07 on the grounds of Vienna’s Steinhof psychiatric hospital. Planned for the use of patients, many of the church’s salient design features fascinatingly address the special concern for hygiene prevalent at the time.

The church interior was entirely cloth in tiles to allow for easy cleaning; the pews were given rounded edges to minimize injuries; and holy water dispensed by a drip rather than the traditional stoup, for fear of infection.

The ornamentation of the Kirche St Leopold encapsulates the quintessential spirit of the Jugendstil, while Otto Wagner’s open floor plan foreshadows the onset of modernism. You will never miss the beautiful stained glass windows and mosaics by artist Koloman Moser, one of the founders of the Vienna Secession.