Karl-Marx-Hof (English: ''

Karl Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...

Court'') is one of the best-known ''

Gemeindebau ''Gemeindebau'' (; plural: ''Gemeindebauten'') is an Austrian German word for "municipality building".''Gemeinde''< ...

ten'' (English: ''municipal housing complexes'') in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

, situated in Heiligenstadt, a neighbourhood of the 19th district of Vienna,

Döbling Döbling () is the 19th District in the city of Vienna, Austria (german: 19. Bezirk, Döbling, Doebling). It is located on the north end from the central districts, north of the districts Alsergrund and Währing. Döbling has some heavily populate ...

. At over a kilometre in length – – and spanning four Straßenbahn (tram) stops, Karl-Marx-Hof is one of the longest single residential buildings in the world.

Development

Karl-Marx-Hof was built on land that, until the 12th century, had been under the waters of the

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , p ...

, deep enough for ships to travel over the area. By 1750, all that remained was a pool of water, which was drained on the order of Holy Roman Emperor

Joseph II Joseph II (German: Josef Benedikt Anton Michael Adam; English: ''Joseph Benedict Anthony Michael Adam''; 13 March 1741 – 20 February 1790) was Holy Roman Emperor from August 1765 and sole ruler of the Habsburg lands from November 29, 1780 un ...

. Gardens were then built in the area, but these were removed by the Vienna city council, then under the "

Red Vienna Red Vienna ( German: ''Rotes Wien'') was the colloquial name for the capital of Austria between 1918 and 1934, when the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria (SDAP) maintained almost unilateral political control over Vienna and, for a sho ...

" period of control by the Social Democratic Party of Austria to make room for the erection of Karl-Marx-Hof, financed by a special tax named after councillor Hugo Breitner, commissioning locally and internationally renowned architects. Karl-Marx-Hof was built between 1927 and 1930 by city planner

Karl Ehn Karl Ehn (1 November 1884 – 26 July 1957) was a Viennese architect and city planner. Biography Ehn apprenticed under Otto Wagner, began working for the Vienna City Administration in 1908, and as City Architect of Vienna was responsi ...

, a follower of

Otto Wagner Otto Koloman Wagner (; 13 July 1841 – 11 April 1918) was an Austrian architect, furniture designer and urban planner. He was a leading member of the Vienna Secession movement of architecture, founded in 1897, and the broader Art Nouveau move ...

. It held 1,382 apartments (with a size of 30–60 m² each). Only 18.5% of the 156,000 m²-large area was built up, with the rest of the area developed into play areas and gardens. Designed for a population of about 5,000, the premises include many amenities, including laundromats, baths,

kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th ce ...

s, a library, doctor's offices, and business offices.

Austrian Civil War, Austrofascism, and the Anschluss

Karl-Marx-Hof was well known during the ''February Uprising'' () of the 1934 Austrian Civil War (). Those insurgents engaged in the revolt barricaded themselves inside the building and were forced to surrender after the

Austrian army The Austrian Armed Forces (german: Bundesheer, lit=Federal Army) are the combined military forces of the Republic of Austria. The military consists of 22,050 active-duty personnel and 125,600 reservists. The military budget is 0.74% of nati ...

, the police, and the Austrofascist paramilitary

Heimwehr The Heimwehr (, ) or Heimatschutz (, ) was a nationalist, initially paramilitary group operating in Austria during the 1920s and 1930s that was similar in methods, organization, and ideology to the Freikorps in Germany. It was opposed to parliam ...

bombarded the site regardless of the unarmed dwellers, mainly worker families, with light artillery. During the

Anschluss The (, or , ), also known as the (, en, Annexation of Austria), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into the German Reich on 13 March 1938. The idea of an (a united Austria and Germany that would form a " Greater Germany ...

, Karl-Marx-Hof was renamed '' Heiligenstädter Hof'', but took its original name back in 1945.

Today

The heavy artillery damage to Karl-Marx-Hof was repaired in the 1950s. It has been used as a filming location for some movies, most notably ''

The Night Porter ''The Night Porter'' ( it, Il portiere di notte) is a 1974 English-language Italian erotic psychological war drama film. Directed and co-written by Liliana Cavani, the film stars Dirk Bogarde and Charlotte Rampling, with Philippe Leroy, Gabriel ...

''. The building was refurbished between 1989 and 1992.

References

External links

Video on the Karl-Marx-Hof and Red Vienna
* {{Authority control Residential buildings in Vienna Public housing in Austria Residential buildings completed in 1930 Buildings and structures in Döbling Austrian Civil War 1930 establishments in Austria

Development

Austrian Civil War, Austrofascism, and the Anschluss

Today

See also

Other very long housing blocks

References

External links