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The City of Vienna Clock Museum has been housed since 1921 in the "Harfenhaus" (Harpist's House), one of the oldest houses in Vienna The collection is on three floors and illustrates the development of clocks from the 15th C to the present day The 1,200 or so exhibits include very basic clocks, tower and table clocks, pocket watches, Austrian lantern timepieces of the Biedermeier period, clocks with illustrated faces, wrist watches, and a 1992 computer clock Following the rebuilding of the second and third floors more Empire and Biedermeier clocks are exhibited One room on the second floor contains only clocks with illustrated faces, and on the third floor are electrical wall clocks with regualtors The development of the wrist watch is illustrated by means of more than 170 items, beginning with some superb jeweled watches from c 1850, followed by First World War trench timepieces, gentlemen's self-winding watches from the 1930s, together with unusual and novelty items from the present day
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Museum Rooms

Room 1: Mainly tower clocks, among one from St Stephen's Cathedral dated 1699 (Cat No 3,043) and the oldest item in the collection, a 15th C tower clock

Room 2: Hand made, weight driven wall clocks The pièce de résistance is an astronomical clock of 1663 (No 794)

Room 3: Traveling, table and wall clocks The four poster bed clock (No

Room 4: Pedestal clocks One of the most valuable is a pendulum clock by Louis Monet of Paris, dated 1752 (No 50)

Room 5: Part of Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach's collection, including a Swiss gold pendant watch c 1800 (Nos 1,490-1,492) Also other valuable gold enameled timepieces

Room 6: Commode, pedestal and traveling clocks The astronomical pedestal clock (No 232) is dated 1810 and comes from a Viennese workshop

Room 7: Rare Japanese clocks, including unusual 18th C pillar clocks (Nos 799-802)

Room 8: Desk clocks and clocks in the form of figures The "Rider's Clock" (No 3,064) is of Austrian manufacture and dates from c 1802

Room 9: Empire grandfather clocks

Room 10: Seven clocks with illustrated faces

Room 11: Biedermeier time pieces in veneered wooden cases

Room 12: Wall clocks and a remarkable astronomical clock of 1863 (No 326)

Room 13: Clocks from the turn of the century; one in the form of a bicycle

Room 14: Clocks from the Black Forest and also a particularly fine Austrian carved cuckoo clock (No 3,065)

Room 15: Novelties, such as a night light clock (No 250), probably Swiss

Room 16: About 270 pocket watches and more than 170 wrist watches dating from 1850 to the present day

Room 17: Toy clocks and automata movements

Room 18: Clocks in the form of flutes, organs and harps

Cost
Adult 360 Euros
Child 140 Euros
 
Tips
Free admission Fridays until noon (holidays excluded) The Vienna Card will give you reduced rates at other times
Photography prohibited