Only the rise of a global pandemic got me started to write a new entry about Café Eiles on this sleeping website – the first entry since 4 years.
We are not allowed to leave our homes. We are required to stay inside, for the sake of our health system and our old and sick ones. Not only in Austria, but all around Europe and in large parts of the world, staying at home has become our routine and every day life.
Even though, hardly a month has passed, the days of moving freely, visiting places, restaurants, friends and events seem long ago already. I always loved to visit new and traditional coffee-houses in Vienna. I miss going to a good Café to read in international newspapers while sipping Melange and watching people passing by and sitting in there.
One of my favorite traditional coffee-houses in Vienna is Café Eiles.
Long tradition, fresh restart
The Café moved into the newly built house at Josefstädterstraße 2 in 1840. It was called Café Motéle back then and was not new, but moved there from its previous location.Very popular among different groups of people during the 1850s, it used to be a meeting point for commoners during the day and attracted Vienna’s demimonde at night. In 1901, Friedrich Eiles became the owner of the Café and thus changed the name to its current name – Café Eiles.
Jumping to more recent times, in the 1980s the Dinjer family took over the Café until Mrs. Dinjer died in 2012. I used to go there quite often before 2012 and I remember that the Café suddenly remained closed and started to seem more and more rundown. A sad experience…
That’s why I was really happy to learn the news in 2015/2016 that the Café was bought and carefully being renovated by Mr. Kunze – to finally reopen!
Tales of the past, in the hustle of the city
Café Eiles is a fantastic and fascinating place. It has gone through a lot of renovations during its long history but still has kept so much of the original look and feel.
The interior furniture by Alois Ortner, dating back to 1933 can still be seen today. Also the Café’s overall atmosphere and patina feels much like in the days before 2012 – at least from my memory.
I especially love the walls full of pictures with famous national and international guests of the Café – some seem to be very old already.
And that’s what matters most to me at Café Eiles: The place lives and breathes history and past, yet at the same time seems so very lively and modern today. I really love what Mr. Kunze and his wonderful, multicultural team have achieved there – to open up and modernize a traditional Viennese Café but not throw away the ‘tales of the past’.
I’m very much looking forward to having my first melange and a delicious Punschkrapfen there again, when we finally will have taken back control over this dreaded virus.