The chairs
are filled again

Thomas Bernhard came to Café Bräunerhof almost every day. Black coffee, the Austrian papers, his usual place. He was not the only one to make this house his own — only, perhaps, the most famous.

We have changed very little, but done a great deal. The benches have been reupholstered, the woodwork cared for, the chandeliers polished back to a glow. Whatever has changed is not meant to catch your eye — only to be felt the moment you step inside.

And because Café Bräunerhof has always been more than coffee, there is more than ever to cook, pour and recommend: from breakfast to dinner, from aperitif to nightcap, from freshly tapped beer to a proper glass of wine. The Bräunerhof is open again…

… and the chairs are filled again.

I have always detested the typical Viennese coffeehouse, famous the world over, because I find everything about it inimical to me. Yet for many years it was at the Bräunerhof that I felt at home… Thomas Bernhard Wittgenstein’s Nephew, Suhrkamp 1982