THE SILVER CHAPEL
Connected to the Court Church (Hofkirche), the Silver Chapel is situated above what today is the passage route to the former city moat. Created as a funerary chapel for Archduke Ferdinand II and his wife Philippine Welser, the chapel was built in two construction phases between 1578 and 1596. Its name derives from the silver reliefs on its Lady Altar.
The chapel comprises two adjacent, rectangular crypt chapels. Situated in the anterior alcove, which was originally planned for the tomb of Ferdinand’s second wife Anna Katharina Gonzaga, is the WOODEN-PIPED ITALIAN LATE RENAISSANCE ORGAN which dates back to 1585. In 1944, following the bomb war, the organ was in a desolate, unplayable condition. The Vorarlberg-based cabinet maker Hubert Neumann was charged with restoring the instrument. He reassembled the damaged pieces; irreparable parts were reconstructed as faithfully as possible to the original. This, however, involved accepting some deviations with regard to the materials used. Cypress wood, for example, was not available and several of the pipes were replaced using larch. Later restoration work was carried out by Pier Paolo Donati (1990–1993) and Jürgen Ahrend (1998). The organ has a manual with 45 keys, a 14-key pedal and 7 stops.