In the 1990s, an Austrian television series caused a scandal. The Piefke Saga written by the Tyrolean author Felix Mitterer, describes the relationship between the German holidaymaker family Sattmann and their hosts in a fictitious Tyrolean holiday resort in four bizarrely amusing episodes. Despite all the scepticism about tourism in its current, sometimes extreme, excesses, it should not be forgotten that tourism was an important factor in Innsbruck and the surrounding area in the 19th century, driving the region's development in the long term, and not just economically.

The first travellers to Innsbruck were pilgrims and business people. Traders, journeymen on the road, civil servants, soldiers, entourages of aristocratic guests at court, skilled workers from various trades, miners, clerics, pilgrims and scientists were the first tourists to be drawn to the city between Italy and Germany. Travelling was expensive, dangerous and arduous. In addition, a large proportion of the subjects were not allowed to leave their own land without the permission of their landlord or abbot. Those who travelled usually did so on the cobbler's pony. Although Innsbruck's inns and innkeepers were already earning money from travellers in the Middle Ages and early modern times, there was no question of tourism as we understand it today. It began when a few crazy travellers were drawn to the mountain peaks for the first time. In addition to a growing middle class, this also required a new attitude towards the Alps. For a long time, the mountains had been a pure threat to people. It was mainly the British who set out to conquer the world's mountains after the oceans. From the late 18th century, the era of Romanticism, news of the natural beauty of the Alps spread through travelogues.

In addition to the alpine attraction, it was the wild and exotic Natives Tirols, die international für Aufsehen sorgten. Der bärtige Revoluzzer namens Andreas Hofer, der es mit seinem Bauernheer geschafft hatte, Napoleons Armee in die Knie zu zwingen, erzeugte bei den Briten, den notorischen Erzfeinden der Franzosen, ebenso großes Interesse wie bei deutschen Nationalisten nördlich der Alpen, die in ihm einen frühen Protodeutschen sahen. Die Tiroler galten als unbeugsamer Menschenschlag, archetypisch und ungezähmt, ähnlich den Germanen unter Arminius, die das Imperium Romanum herausgefordert hatten. Die Beschreibungen Innsbrucks aus der Feder des Autors Beda Weber (1798 – 1858) und andere Reiseberichte in der boomenden Presselandschaft dieser Zeit trugen dazu bei, ein attraktives Bild Innsbrucks zu prägen.

Nun mussten die wilden Alpen nur noch der Masse an Touristen zugänglich gemacht werden, die zwar gerne den frühen Abenteurern auf ihren Expeditionen nacheifern wollten, deren Risikobereitschaft und Fitness mit den Wünschen nicht schritthalten konnten. Der German Alpine Club eröffnete 1869 eine Sektion Innsbruck, nachdem der 1862 Österreichische Alpenverein wenig erfolgreich war. Angetrieben vom großdeutschen Gedanken vieler Mitglieder fusionierten die beiden Institutionen 1873. Der Alpenverein ist bis heute bürgerlich geprägt, sein sozialdemokratisches Pendant sind die Naturfreunde. The network of trails grew through its development, as did the number of huts that could accommodate guests. The Tyrolean theologian Franz Senn (1831 - 1884) and the writer Adolf Pichler (1819 - 1900) were instrumental in surveying Tyrol and creating maps. Contrary to popular belief, the Tyroleans were not born mountaineers, but had to be taught the skills to conquer the mountains. Until then, mountains had been one thing above all: dangerous and arduous in everyday agricultural life. Climbing them had hardly occurred to anyone before. The Alpine clubs also trained mountain guides. From the turn of the century, skiing came into fashion alongside hiking and mountaineering. There were no lifts yet, and to get up the mountains you had to use the skins that are still glued to touring skis today. It was not until the 1920s, following the construction of the cable cars on the Nordkette and Patscherkofel mountains, that a wealthy clientele was able to enjoy the modern luxury of mountain lifts while skiing.  

New hotels, cafés, inns, shops and means of transport were needed to meet the needs of the guests. Entrepreneurs such as Robert Nißl, who took over Büchsenhausen Castle in 1865 and converted it into a brewery, invested in the infrastructure. Former aristocratic residences such as Weiherburg Castle became inns and hotels. The revolution in Innsbruck did not take place on the barricades in 1848, but in the tourism industry a few decades later, when resourceful citizens replaced the aristocracy as owners of castles such as Büchsenhausen and Weiherburg.

With the Grand Hotel Europa had also opened a first-class hotel in Innsbruck in 1869, replacing the often outdated inns in the historic city centre as the accommodation of choice. This was followed in 1892 by the contemporary Reformhotel Habsburger Hof a second large company. The Habsburg Court already offered its guests electric light, an absolute sensation. Also located at the railway station was the Arlberger Hof. What would be seen as a competitive disadvantage today was a selling point at the time. Railway stations were the centres of modern cities. Station squares were not overcrowded transport hubs as they are today, but sophisticated and well-kept places in front of the architecturally sophisticated halls where the trains arrived.

The number of guests increased slowly but steadily. Shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, Innsbruck had 200,000 guests. In June 1896, the Innsbrucker Nachrichten:

„Der Fremdenverkehr in Innsbruck bezifferte sich im Monat Mai auf 5647 Personen. Darunter befanden sich (außer 2763 Reisenden aus Oesterreich-Ungarn) 1974 Reichsdeutsche, 282 Engländer, 65 Italiener, 68 Franzosen, 53 Amerikaner, 51 Russen und 388 Personen aus verschiedenen anderen Ländern.“

In addition to the number of travellers who had an impact on life in the small town of Innsbruck, it was also the internationality of the visitors who gradually gave Innsbruck a new look. In addition to the purely touristic infrastructure, the development of general innovations was also accelerated. The wealthy guests could hardly socialise in pubs with cesspits behind their houses. Of course, a sewerage system would have been on the agenda anyway, but the economic factor of tourism made it possible and accelerated the release of funds for the major projects at the turn of the century. This not only changed the appearance of the town, but also people's everyday and working lives. Resourceful entrepreneurs such as Heinrich Menardi managed to expand the value chain to include paid holiday pleasures in addition to board and lodging. In 1880, he opened the Lohnkutscherei und Autovermietung Heinrich Menardi for excursions in the Alpine surroundings. Initially with carriages, and after the First World War with coaches and cars, wealthy tourists were chauffeured as far as Venice. The company still exists today and is now based in the Menardihaus at Wilhelm-Greil-Strasse 17 opposite Landhausplatz, even though over time the transport and trading industry shifted to the more lucrative property sector. Local trade also benefited from the wealthy clientele from abroad.

Innsbruck and the surrounding towns were also known for spa holidays, the predecessor of today's wellness, where well-heeled clients recovered from a wide variety of illnesses in an Alpine environment. The Igler Hof, back then Grandhotel Igler Hof and the Sporthotel Igls, still partly exude the chic of that time. Michael Obexer, the founder of the spa town of Igls and owner of the Grand Hotel, was a tourism pioneer. There were two spas in Egerdach near Amras and in Mühlau. The facilities were not as well-known as the hotspots of the time in Bad Ischl, Marienbad or Baden near Vienna, as can be seen on old photos and postcards, but the treatments with brine, steam, gymnastics and even magnetism were in line with the standards of the time, some of which are still popular with spa and wellness holidaymakers today. Bad Egerdach near Innsbruck had been known as a healing spring since the 17th century. The spring was said to cure gout, skin diseases, anaemia and even the nervous disorder known in the 19th century as neurasthenia, the predecessor of burnout. The institution's chapel still exists today opposite the SOS Children's Village. The bathing establishment in Mühlau has existed since 1768 and was converted into an inn and spa in the style of the time in the course of the 19th century. The former bathing establishment is now a residential building worth seeing in Anton-Rauch-Straße. However, the most spectacular tourist project that Innsbruck ever experienced was probably Hoch Innsbruck, today's Hungerburg. Not only the Hungerburg railway and hotels, but even its own lake was created here after the turn of the century to attract guests.

One of the former owners of the land of the Hungerburg and Innsbruck tourism pioneer, Richard von Attlmayr, was significantly involved in the predecessor of today's tourism association. Since 1881, the Innsbruck Beautification Association to satisfy the increasing needs of guests. The association took care of the construction of hiking and walking trails, the installation of benches and the development of impassable areas such as the Mühlauer Klamm or the Sillschlucht gorge. The striking green benches along many paths are a reminder of the still existing association. 1888 years later, the profiteers of tourism in Innsbruck founded the Commission for the promotion of tourismthe predecessor of today's tourism association. By joining forces in advertising and quality assurance at the accommodation establishments, the individual businesses hoped to further boost tourism.

„Alljährlich mehrt sich die Zahl der überseeischen Pilger, die unser Land und dessen gletscherbekrönte Berge zum Verdrusse unserer freundnachbarlichen Schweizer besuchen und manch klingenden Dollar zurücklassen. Die Engländer fangen an Tirol ebenso interessant zu finden wie die Schweiz, die Zahl der Franzosen und Niederländer, die den Sommer bei uns zubringen, mehrt sich von Jahr zu Jahr.“

Postkarten waren die ersten massentauglichen Influencer der Tourismusgeschichte. Viele Betriebe ließen ihre eigenen Postkarten drucken. Verlage produzierten unzählige Sujets der beliebtesten Sehenswürdigkeiten der Stadt. Es ist interessant zu sehen, was damals als sehenswert galt und auf den Karten abgebildet wurde. Anders als heute waren es vor allem die zeitgenössisch modernen Errungenschaften der Stadt: der Leopoldbrunnen, das Stadtcafé beim Theater, die Kettenbrücke, die Zahnradbahn auf die Hungerburg oder die 1845 eröffnete Stefansbrücke an der Brennerstraße, die als Steinbogen aus Quadern die Sill überquerte, waren die Attraktionen. Auch Andreas Hofer war ein gut funktionierendes Testimonial auf den Postkarten: Der Gasthof Schupfen in dem Andreas Hofer sein Hauptquartier hatte und der Berg Isel mit dem großen Andreas-Hofer-Denkmal waren gerne abgebildete Motive.

1914 gab es in Innsbruck 17 Hotels, die Gäste anlockten. Dazu kamen die Sommer- und Winterfrischler in Igls und dem Stubaital. Der Erste Weltkrieg ließ die erste touristische Welle mit einem Streich versanden. Gerade als sich der Fremdenverkehr Ende der 1920er Jahre langsam wieder erholt hatte, kamen mit der Wirtschaftskrise und Hitlers 1000 Mark blockThe next setback came in 1933, when he tried to put pressure on the Austrian government to end the ban on the NSDAP.

It required the Economic miracle in the 1950s and 1960s to revitalise tourism in Innsbruck after the destruction. After the arduous war years and the reconstruction of the European economy, Tyrol and Innsbruck were able to slowly but steadily establish tourism as a stable source of income, even away from the official hotels and guesthouses. Many Innsbruck families moved together in their already cramped flats to supplement their household budgets by renting out beds to guests from abroad. Tourism not only brought in foreign currency, but also enabled the locals to create a new image of themselves both internally and externally. The war enemies of past decades became guests and hosts.

Few eras are more difficult to grasp than the interwar period. The Roaring TwentiesJazz and automobiles come to mind, as do inflation and the economic crisis. In big cities like Berlin, young ladies behaved as Flappers with a bobbed head, cigarette and short skirts, lascivious to the new sounds, Innsbruck's population, as part of the young Republic of Austria, belonged for the most part to the faction of poverty, economic crisis and political polarisation.

Although the Republic of German-Austria had been proclaimed, it was unclear how things would continue in Austria. The new Austria seemed too small and not viable. The monarchy and nobility were banned. The bureaucratic state of the k.u.k. Empire seamlessly asserted itself under a new flag and name. The federal states, as successors to the old crown lands, were given a great deal of room for manoeuvre in legislation and administration within the framework of federalism. However, enthusiasm for the new state was limited among the population. Not only was the supply situation miserable after the loss of the vast majority of the former Habsburg empire, people mistrusted the basic idea of the republic. The monarchy had not been perfect, but only very few people could relate to the idea of democracy. Instead of being subjects of the emperor, they were now citizens, but only citizens of a dwarf state with an oversized capital that was little loved in the provinces instead of a large empire. In the former crown lands, most of which were governed by Christian socialists, people liked to speak of the Viennese water headwho was fed by the yields of the industrious rural population.

Other federal states also toyed with the idea of seceding from the Republic after the plan to join Germany, which was supported by all parties, was prohibited by the victorious powers of the First World War. The Tyrolean plans, however, were particularly spectacular. From a neutral Alpine state with other federal states, a free state consisting of Tyrol and Bavaria or from Kufstein to Salurn, an annexation to Switzerland and even a Catholic church state under papal leadership, there were many ideas. The most obvious solution was particularly popular. In Tyrol, feeling German was nothing new. So why not align oneself politically with the big brother in the north? This desire was particularly pronounced among urban elites and students. The annexation to Germany was approved by 98% in a vote in Tyrol, but never materialised.

Instead of becoming part of Germany, they were subject to the unloved Wallschen. Italian troops occupied Innsbruck for almost two years after the end of the war. At the peace negotiations in Paris, the Brenner Pass was declared the new border. The historic Tyrol was divided in two. The military was stationed at the Brenner Pass to secure a border that had never existed before and was perceived as unnatural and unjust. In 1924, the Innsbruck municipal council decided to name squares and streets around the main railway station after South Tyrolean towns. Bozner Platz, Brixnerstrasse and Salurnerstrasse still bear their names today. Many people on both sides of the Brenner felt betrayed. Although the war was far from won, they did not see themselves as losers to Italy. Hatred of Italians reached its peak in the interwar period, even if the occupying troops were emphatically lenient. A passage from the short story collection "The front above the peaks" by the National Socialist author Karl Springenschmid from the 1930s reflects the general mood:

"The young girl says, 'Becoming Italian would be the worst thing.

Old Tappeiner just nods and grumbles: "I know it myself and we all know it: becoming a whale would be the worst thing."

Trouble also loomed in domestic politics. The revolution in Russia and the ensuing civil war with millions of deaths, expropriation and a complete reversal of the system cast its long shadow all the way to Austria. The prospect of Soviet conditions made people afraid. Austria was deeply divided. Capital and provinces, city and countryside, citizens, workers and farmers - in the vacuum of the first post-war years, each group wanted to shape the future according to their own ideas. The divide was not only on a political level. Morality, family, leisure activities, education, faith, understanding of the law - every area of life was affected. Who should rule? How should wealth, rights and duties be distributed? A communist coup was not a real danger, especially in Tyrol, but could be easily instrumentalised in the media as a threat to discredit social democracy. In 1919, a workers', peasants' and soldiers' council modelled on the Soviet model was formed in Innsbruck, but its influence remained limited and was not supported by any party. The soldiers' councils officially formed from 1920 onwards were dominated by Christian socialists. The peasant and middle-class camp to the right of centre subsequently militarised with the Tiroler Heimatwehr more professionally and in greater numbers than left-wing groups. Nevertheless, social democracy was criticised from church pulpits and in the conservative media as Jewish Party and homeless traitors to their country. They were all too readily blamed for the lost war and its consequences. The Tiroler Anzeiger summarised the people's fears in a nutshell: "Woe to the Christian people if the Jews=Socialists win the elections!".

While in the rural districts the Tyrolean People's Party as a merger of Farmers' Union, People's Association und Catholic Labour Despite the strong headwinds in Innsbruck, the Social Democrats under the leadership of Martin Rapoldi were able to win between 30 and 50% of the vote in the first elections in 1919. The fact that it did not work out for the comrades with the mayor's seat was due to the majorities in the municipal council through alliances of the other parties. Liberals and Tyrolean People's Party was at least as hostile to social democracy as he was to the federal capital Vienna and the Italian occupiers.

Die hohe Politik war aber nur der Rahmen des eigentlichen Elends. Die als Spanish flu This epidemic, which has gone down in history, also took its toll in Innsbruck in the years following the war. Exact figures were not recorded, but the number of deaths worldwide is estimated at 27 - 50 million. Many Innsbruck residents had not returned home from the battlefields and were missing as fathers, husbands and labourers. Many of those who had made it back were wounded and scarred by the horrors of war. As late as February 1920, the "Tyrolean Committee of the Siberians" at the Gasthof Breinößl "...in favour of the fund for the repatriation of our prisoners of war...“ einen Benefizabend. Noch lange nach dem Krieg bedurfte das Land Tirol Hilfe von auswärts, um die Bevölkerung zu ernähren. Unter der Überschrift „Erhebliche Ausdehnung der amerikanischen Kinderhilfsaktion in Tirol“ stand am 9. April 1921 in den Innsbrucker Nachrichten zu lesen: „Den Bedürfnissen des Landes Tirol Rechnung tragend, haben die amerikanischen Vertreter für Oesterreich in hochherzigster Weise die tägliche Mahlzeitenanzahl auf 18.000 Portionen erhöht.“

Dazu kam die Arbeitslosigkeit. Vor allem Beamte und Mitarbeiter im öffentlichen Dienst, hatten ihre Arbeit verloren, nachdem der Völkerbund seine Anleihe an herbe Sparmaßnahmen geknüpft hatte. Der Tourismus als Wirtschaftsfaktor war ob der Probleme in den umliegenden, vom Krieg ebenfalls gebeutelten Ländern inexistent. Die Stadtplanung stand ebenfalls vor großen Fragen. Was sollte aus öffentlichen Gebäuden wie Kasernen, Burgen und Palästen gemacht werden? In den ersten Jahren passierte nur sehr wenig. Erst mit der Währungssanierung und der Einführung des Schillings 1925 als neuer Währung unter Kanzler Ignaz Seipel begann Innsbruck sich langsam zu erholen und konnte die Modernisierung der Stadt einleiten. Große Projekte wie das Tivoli, das Städtische Hallenbad, die Höhenstraße auf die Hungerburg, die Bergbahnen auf den Berg Isel und die Nordkette, neue Schulen und Wohnblöcke konnten erst nach der Überwindung der ersten Nachkriegsprobleme entstehen. Die Handschrift der neuen, großen Massenparteien in der Gestaltung dieser Projekte ist dabei nicht zu übersehen.

The first republic was a difficult birth from the remnants of the former monarchy and it was not to last long. Despite the post-war problems, however, a lot of positive things also happened in the First Republic. Subjects became citizens. What began in the time of Maria Theresa was now continued under new auspices. The change from subject to citizen was characterised not only by a new right to vote, but above all by the increased care of the state. State regulations, schools, kindergartens, labour offices, hospitals and municipal housing estates replaced the benevolence of wealthy citizens, the monarchy and the church. Times were hard and the new system had not yet been honed.

To this day, much of the Austrian state and Innsbruck's cityscape and infrastructure are based on what emerged after the collapse of the monarchy. In Innsbruck, there are no conscious memorials to the emergence of the First Republic in Austria. The listed residential complexes such as the Slaughterhouse blockthe Pembaurblock or the Mandelsbergerblock oder die Pembaurschule sind Stein gewordene Zeitzeugen.

The caesura of the First World War not only changed Innsbruck economically and socially, but also gave the city a new appearance. The visual arts reinvented themselves after the horrors of war. The classicism of the turn of the century was the architecture of a bourgeoisie that had tried to imitate the nobility. After the war, many citizens blamed this aristocracy for the horrors on the battlefields of Europe. Even before the war, sport and the phenomenon of leisure had become the expression of a new bourgeois self-image in contrast to the old order determined by the aristocracy. From now on, buildings and infrastructure were to serve every citizen equally. Aristocratic virtues and interest in classical antiquity had lost their lustre within a very short space of time.

The architects of the post-war period wanted to distinguish themselves from previous generations in terms of appearance, while at the same time maximising the functionality of the buildings. The end of the monarchy is reflected in the simplicity of the architecture. Lois Welzenbacher wrote about the architectural aberrations of this period in an article in the magazine Tiroler Hochland in 1920:

"As far as we can judge today, it is clear that the 19th century lacked the strength to create its own distinct style. It is the age of stillness... Thus details were reproduced with historical accuracy, mostly without any particular meaning or purpose, and without a harmonious overall picture that would have arisen from factual or artistic necessity."

New forms of design such as the Bauhaus style from Weimar, high-rise buildings from the USA and the Soviet modernity from the revolutionary USSR found their way into design, construction and craftsmanship. The best-known Tyrolean representatives of this new way of designing public spaces were Siegfried Mazagg, Theodor Prachensky, Clemens Holzmeister and Lois Welzenbacher. Each of these architects had their own specialities, making it difficult to clearly define Tyrolean Modernism. Buildings such as the Innsbruck power station in Salurnerstrasse, the Adambräu and the former Hotel Mariabrunn on the Hungerburg were striking buildings, not only of unimaginable height but also in a completely new style. Despite all the enthusiasm for the dawn of a new era, there was also a current of thought that is problematic for those of us born later. The Futurism of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti not only exerted a great attraction on Italian fascism, but also on many representatives of modernist art and architecture.

The best-known and most impressive representative of the so-called Tiroler Moderne was Franz Baumann (1892 - 1974). Baumann was born in Innsbruck in 1892, the son of a postal clerk. The theologian, publicist and war propagandist Anton Müllner, alias Brother Willram, became aware of Franz Baumann's talent as a draughtsman and at the age of 14 enabled the young man to attend the Staatsgewerbeschule, today's HTL. It was here that he met his future brother-in-law Theodor Prachensky. Together with Baumann's sister Maria, the two young men went on excursions in the area around Innsbruck to paint pictures of the mountains and nature. During his school years, he gained his first professional experience as a bricklayer at the construction company Huter & Söhne, which was responsible for major projects in Innsbruck such as the Monastery of Perpetual Adoration and the Church of St Nicholas. In 1910, Baumann followed his friend Prachensky to Merano to work for the company Musch & Lun. At the time, Merano was Tyrol's most important tourist resort with international spa guests. The predominant styles were Art Nouveau and Historicism. Under the architect Adalbert Erlebach, he gained his first experience in the planning of large-scale projects such as hotels and cable cars.

Like the majority of his generation, the First World War tore Baumann from his professional and everyday life. On the Italian front, he was shot in the stomach while fighting, from which he recovered in a military hospital in Prague. During this otherwise idle time, he painted cityscapes of buildings in and around Prague. These pictures, which would later help him to visualise his plans, were presented in his only exhibition in 1919.

After returning home from the war, Baumann worked at Grissemann & Walch and completed his professional qualification. Unlike Holzmeister or Welzenbacher, he had no academic training. In his spare time, he regularly took part in public tenders for public projects.

His big breakthrough came in the second half of the 1920s. Baumann was able to win the tenders for the remodelling of the Weinhaus Happ in the old town and the Nordkettenbahn railway. In addition to his creativity and ability to think holistically, he was also able to harmonise his approach with the legal situation and the requirements of the tenders of the 1920s. According to the federal constitution of the Republic of Austria, construction was a state matter. Since the previous year, the Tyrolean Heritage Protection Association Together with the district authority, it was the final authority responsible for the assessment and approval of construction projects. Kunibert Zimmeter had already founded the association in 1908 together with Gotthard Graf Trapp. Zimmeter wrote in his book "Our Tyrol. A heritage book":

"Let us look at the flattening of our private lives, our amusements, at the centre of which, significantly, is the cinema, at the literary ephemera of our newspaper reading, at the hopeless and costly excesses of fashion in the field of women's clothing, let us take a look at our homes with the miserable factory furniture and all the dreadful products of our so-called gallantry goods industry, Things that thousands of people work to produce, creating worthless bric-a-brac in the process, or let us look at our apartment blocks and villas with their cement façades simulating palaces, countless superfluous towers and gables, our hotels with their pompous façades, what a waste of the people's wealth, what an abundance of tastelessness we must find there."

Nature and townscape should be protected from overly fashionable trends, excessive tourism and ugly industrial buildings. Building projects were to be integrated harmoniously, attractively and appropriately into the environment. Despite the social and artistic innovations of the time, architects had to bear in mind the typical character of the region.

After the First World War, a new class of customers and guests emerged that placed new demands on buildings and therefore on the construction industry. In many Tyrolean villages, hotels had replaced churches as the largest building in the townscape. Mountain villages such as Igls, Seefeld and St. Anton were completely remodelled by tourism, and in Innsbruck a new district was created with the Hungerburg. The aristocratic distance from the mountains had given way to a bourgeois enthusiasm for sport. This called for new solutions at new heights. No more grand hotels were built at 1500 m for spa holidays, but a complete infrastructure for skiers in high alpine terrain such as the Nordkette. During his time in Merano, Baumann had already come into contact with the local heritage organisation. This is precisely where the strengths of his approach to holistic construction in the Tyrolean sense lay. All technical functions and details, the embedding of the buildings in the landscape, taking into account the topography and sunlight, played a role for him, who was not officially allowed to use the title of architect. He thus followed the "Rules for those who build in the mountains" by the architect Adolf Loos from 1913:

Don't build picturesquely. Leave such effects to the walls, the mountains and the sun. The man who dresses picturesquely is not picturesque, but a buffoon. The farmer does not dress picturesquely. But he is...

Pay attention to the forms in which the farmer builds. For they are ancestral wisdom, congealed substance. But seek out the reason for the mould. If advances in technology have made it possible to improve the mould, then this improvement should always be used. The flail will be replaced by the threshing machine."

Baumann designed even the smallest details, from the exterior lighting to the furniture, and integrated them into his overall concept of the Tiroler Moderne in.

From 1927, Baumann worked independently in his studio in Schöpfstraße in Wilten. He repeatedly came into contact with his brother-in-law and employee of the building authority, Theodor Prachensky. From 1929, the two of them worked together to design the building for the new Hötting secondary school on Fürstenweg. Although boys and girls were still to be planned separately in the traditional way, the building was otherwise completely in keeping with the New Objectivity style in terms of form and furnishings, based on the principle of light, air and sun. In 1935 he managed the project Hörtnaglsiedlung in the west of the city.

In his heyday, he employed 14 people in his office. Thanks to his modern approach, which combined function, aesthetics and economical construction, he survived the economic crisis well. The 1,000-mark freeze that Hitler imposed on Austria in 1934 in order to put the Republic in financial difficulties heralded the slow decline of his architectural practice. Not only did the unemployment rate in tourism triple within a very short space of time, but the construction industry also ran into difficulties.

In 1935, Baumann became the shooting star of the Tyrolean architecture scene and was appointed head of the Central Association of Architects after he was finally allowed to use this professional title with a special licence. After the Anschluss in 1938, he quickly joined the NSDAP. On the one hand, he was probably not averse to the ideas of National Socialism, but on the other he was able to further his career as chairman of the Reich Chamber of Fine Arts in Tyrol. In this position, he courageously opposed the destructive furore with which those in power wanted to change Innsbruck's cityscape, which did not correspond to his idea of urban planning. The mayor of Innsbruck, Egon Denz, wanted to remove the Triumphal Gate and St Anne's Column in order to make more room for traffic in Maria-Theresienstraße. The city centre was still a transit area from the Brenner Pass in the south to reach the main road to the east and west on today's Innrain. At the request of Gauleiter Franz Hofer, a statue of Adolf Hitler as a German herald was to be erected in place of St Anne's Column. Hofer also wanted to have the church towers of the collegiate church blown up. Baumann's opinion on these plans was negative. When the matter made it to Albert Speer's desk, he agreed with him. From this point onwards, Baumann was no longer awarded any public projects by Gauleiter Hofer.

After being questioned as part of the denazification process, Baumann began working at the city building authority, probably on the recommendation of his brother-in-law Prachensky. Baumann was fully exonerated, among other things by a statement from the Abbot of Wilten, but his reputation as an architect could no longer be repaired. Moreover, his studio in Schöpfstraße had been destroyed by a bomb in 1944. In his post-war career, he was responsible for the renovation of buildings damaged by the war. Under his leadership, Boznerplatz with the Rudolfsbrunnen fountain was rebuilt as well as Burggraben and the new Stadtsäle (Note: today House of Music).

Franz Baumann died in 1974 and his paintings, sketches and drawings are highly sought-after and highly traded. The diverse public and private buildings and projects of the ever-smoking architect still characterise Innsbruck today.