Schonburnn and Hofburg vs. Kew

Compare and contrast the palaces: Vienna- Schonbrunn-summer, big garden and Hofburg; London- Kew

In Vienna, the two palaces we visited were both where Empress Sissi lived. The Hofburg palace was considered to be the winter palace. This was where Hapsburg’s lived most of the time (they lived there for about seven months out of the twelve months of the year) This palace had more room for Sissi to do more things as she pleased. Since she was very anorexic, there was a "gym" for her to get her exercise in. Her bathroom itself was about the size of two rooms in the summer palace. The rooms in the summer palace were connected with hallways, rather than having it be one room to the next, so Sissi had a lot more privacy here. Sissi's husband, Emperor Franz Joseph, would have to ring a bell in order to get one of Sissi's servants to answer to ask if he could talk to her.

The Schonbrunn was considered to be the summer palace, where Sissi spent the summer months in. It was much smaller in comparison to the Hofburg and had a more of a restrictive feel to it. Women were not allowed to go out and do as much as the men were and they were essentially caged in. For example, Sissi loved to hunt, ride horses, feed the animals etc. but now that she is in the public eye it is considered un-lady like and therefore she was no longer allowed to do any of these things. It was very easy to feel very isolated and alone in the summer palace, which is why Sissi soon became very depressed. The rooms did not have hallways to get to each room, you had to go through each room to get to where you needed to be. Sissi's privacy was limited then since everyone was walking through her rooms because she didn't have much choice. The only privacy she was able to get would have been if she walked in the very large gardens they had.

The palace we visited in London was the Kew palace. The Kew palace was much smaller than both the Hofburg and Schonbrunn place. It was almost as if it was just a very large house for Queen Charlotte to live in. The Kew did not have any problems with worrying about what kind of privacy they had. Charlotte had married someone with whom she actually loved (it wasn't arranged and within the family line) and had fifteen children, therefore she was much happier than Empress Sissi.