Vienna Tourist Trap Tips by Phillylawyer_19107

As an avid dollhouse and miniatures fan I was eager to see the Doll and toy museum (Puppen- & Spielzeugmuseum) in Vienna. According to the information I had, there were some lovely doll houses to see. The museum is housed in a nice old house with a lovely courtyard. We went up to the first floor and were charged the amazingly high admission of Euro 4.70 (about 4.50 US$). Vienna is not cheap, but generally doll and toy museums are quite small. Well, our expectations were high after paying so much. What we found was three medium-sized rooms which showed dolls of all kinds and sizes and ages and just one single doll house (and not further toys to mention). It was nice for someone who really likes doll, but the admission was outrageous and maybe they should change their name to doll museum, because as it is now, I think they did a bit of false advertising.

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At Least Do This: If you really like dolls and are willing to fork out nearly 5 $ for seeing them - you'll be fine. But only then.

This is not really a tourist trap but a travel guidebook trap. In several travel guides and on the internet I saw that there is a collection of clothing from past centuries in Vienna, a famously large collection including court dresses. I definitely wanted to go there and after finding out it was a bit South of Vienna, in Hetzendorf, in a castle, we went there. Well, what can I tell you....there was a nice plaque on the castle gate saying that the fashion collection ("Modesammlung") was there as well as a fashion school, but inside the building there were just school offices. Finally we found some people inside an office and asked them about the museum/collection and they were absolutely surprised and had no idea what we were talking about. - Well, after I got home, I did some research and it seems that this collection is not open to the public. Maybe I should tell this to the travel guide publishers....

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Alternative: Currently (summer 2003) there is an exhibition about 20th century fashion in the Hermesvilla in the Lainzer Tiergarten. We didn't go there for lack of time but it sounded quite interesting. Otherwise - wait until you get to Bath/UK and visit the fabulous Museum of Costume....