Friedrich von Schmidt (October 22, 1825 – January 23, 1891) was an architect who worked in late 19th century Vienna.

Life and career

Von Schmidt was born in

Frickenhofen Gschwend may refer to: Places * Gschwend, Baden-Württemberg, Gschwend, a town in the German state of Baden-Württemberg * Mrtvice, Kočevje, Gschwend in German, a settlement northwest of the town of Kočevje in southern Slovenia People

* Bri ...

, Gschwend, Württemberg, Germany. After studying at the technical high school in

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...

under Breymann and Mauch, he became, in 1845, one of the guild workers employed in building Cologne Cathedral, on which he worked for fifteen years. Most of the working drawings for the towers were made by Schmidt and Vincenz Statz. In 1848 he attained the rank of master-workman and in 1856 passed the state examination as architect. After becoming a Catholic in 1858, he went to Milan as professor of architecture and began the restoration of the cathedral of

Sant'Ambrogio Sant'Ambrogio may refer to the following entities in Italy: * Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio, a church in the Milan * Sant'Ambrogio, Florence, a Roman Catholic church in Florence * Sant'Ambrogio di Torino, a municipality in the Turin * Sant'Ambrogio di ...

. On account of the confusion caused by the war of 1859 he went to Vienna, where he was a professor at the academy and cathedral architect from 1862; in 1865 he received the title of chief architect, and in 1888 was ennobled by the emperor. In the

Gothic Revival Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

style he built in Vienna the , Saint Othmar's Church (in German: ''Sankt Othmar unter den Weißgerbern'', literally "Saint Othmar among the White Tanners") in the 3rd district ( Landstraße) and that of the

Brigittines The Bridgettines, or Birgittines, formally known as the Order of the Most Holy Savior (; abbreviated OSsS), is a monastic religious order of the Catholic Church founded by Saint Birgitta or Bridget of Sweden in 1344, and approved by Pope Urban ...

. He also built a school, the Akademisches Gymnasium, with a Gothic facade and the memorial building erected on the site of the amphitheatre that had been destroyed by fire. The last mentioned building was in Venetian Gothic. A large number of small ecclesiastical and secular buildings in Austria and Germany were designed by him. His last work was the restoration of the cathedral in Pécs in Hungary. His chief fame however he gained by his restoration of St. Stephen's Cathedral, Vienna. He took down the spire and worked on its rebuilding up to 1872. He also designed the Town Hall or Rathaus, Vienna, with a projecting middle section which has a central tower that rises free to a height of 328 ft. and is flanked by four smaller towers. A large court and six smaller ones are enclosed by the extensive building, the wings of which end in pavilions. In building the parish church in Funfhaus he even ventured to set a facade with two towers in front of an octagonal central structure with a high cupola and a corona of chapels. His motto was to unite German force with Italian freedom. He modified the tendency to height in the German Gothic by horizontal members and introduced many modifications into the old standard of the style in the hope of attaining a more agreeable general effect. He also designed

Vaduz Cathedral Vaduz Cathedral, or Cathedral of St. Florin (German language, German: ''St. Florinskirche in Vaduz'' or ''Kathedrale St. Florin''), is a neo-Gothic church in Vaduz, Liechtenstein, and the centre of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vaduz. Origin ...

and St. Joseph's Cathedral in Bucharest. From 1870 to 1882, he worked as chief architect on the neoromanesque

Cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul in Đakovo A cathedral is a church that contains the '' cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually specific to those Christian denomination ...

as successor of

Carl Roesner Carl Roesner (19 June 1804, Vienna - 13 July 1869, Steyr) was an Austrian architect. Life He studied architecture in Vienna and Rome. In 1826, he began his work as a proofreader for lectures at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and, in 1835, beca ...

. He was teacher and model to many younger architects, including

Friedrich Grünanger Friedrich Grünanger (25 January 1856 – 14 December 1929) was a Transylvania, Transylvanian Austrians, Austrian architect who worked primarily in Bulgaria. Born in Schäßburg in Austria-Hungary (today Sighişoara in Romania), Grünanger studi ...

Frigyes Schulek Frigyes Schulek (19 November 1841 – 5 September 1919) was a Hungarian architect,

, Imre Steindl, and

Karl Troll Karl Troll (November 1, 1865 in Oberwölbling, Lower Austria – December 30, 1954 in Vienna) was an Austrian architect. Karl Troll was the son of a carpenter from a small village in Lower Austria. He was sent to Vienna to learn textile printi ...

. A bronze statue of him has been placed before the town-hall of Vienna. His son Heinrich was overseer at the building of the cathedral of Frankfurt and afterwards professor of medieval architecture in Munich. He died in Vienna, aged 65.

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Schmidt, Friedrich von 1825 births 1891 deaths People from Ostalbkreis Austrian people of German descent Austrian Roman Catholics Converts to Roman Catholicism Gothic Revival architects Academics of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class) 19th-century Austrian architects