Ottakringer Tempel

The Ottakringer Tempel once stood in the 16th district of Vienna, a brick synagogue built between 1885 and 1886 to designs by Ludwig Tischler. It served the fast-growing Jewish communities in Ottakring, Neulerchenfeld and Hernals before the city expanded. The site was donated by Ignaz von Kuffner, a brewery owner and noted philanthropist. In 1928 an extra winter schoolroom was added by architect Ignaz Reiser. During the November pogroms of 1938 the building was gutted and left as a ruin, though it survived the war intact enough to repair. Inside, the synagogue followed a three-aisled plan with two-storey timber galleries supported by masonry piers. Three doorways led to a vestibule that opened into the main hall, which held 406 seats for men. Women occupied 266 places on the upper tiers reached by staircases. The ceiling was a wooden structure, plain and functional. The exterior, dressed in Renaissance style, gave little hint of its religious purpose until the central gable with its triangular pediment and twin tablets of the Law were seen. Today only the memory remains, preserved in photographs and measured drawings. The site at Hubergasse 8 is now occupied by modern housing, but the reconstructed gable with its tablets and Stars of David still appears in virtual tours. The vanished building is one of many synagogues destroyed in Vienna during the 1930s, recalled through scholarly work by Pierre Genée and the digital reconstruction led by Gerlinde Grötzmeier.