Marianneum

The Marianneum was a retreat and education centre run by the Lazarists, with a Roman Catholic church attached, in the Hetzendorf district of Meidling in Vienna’s 12th district. It stood on Hetzendorfer Straße 117, where a garden remains today. The site was once home to a children’s asylum founded in 1882 by the Sisters of St Vincent de Paul, who named it the Marianneum after combining the names of Mary and Anna. The church was granted public rights in 1888 and later became a boys’ seminary under the Lazarists in 1918. It later served as a mother-and-child home and a retirement home before becoming an exercises and education house in 1988. That year the church was restored and its original wall paintings were recovered. The chapel was designed in the neogothic style by Ludwig Zatzka, inspired by the master builder of Vienna Cathedral, Friedrich von Schmidt. Inside, the church presents a single hall facing south, with a two-bay choir and an organ loft on pier arcades. Above the pointed-arch portal sits a gable topped by a small roof turret. The high altar features figures of Joachim and Anna with Mary, alongside Saints Joseph and Vincent de Paul. A monumental Last Judgement by Hans Zatzka, the architect’s brother, covers the chancel arch and dates from 1887. The uniform neogothic furnishings all date from the building’s original construction.