This week’s musical detour comes courtesy of a record store find. We spotted Round Round, grabbed it immediately without looking too closely obviously thinking it was the full 2002 sugababes album - only to discover at home that it was not. Instead it contained exactly four different remixes Round Round and nothing else. Iconic.

The Craigie and Crichton Remix is my pick - and how to listen? My top recommendation is, naturally, to buy the vinyl and play it through a temperamental 70s hi-fi sound system. A close second, should your setup be more digital than romantic, is to play it at almost full volume on a solo walk home (after exactly one too many punsch - the perfect sweet spot) in the icy December air.

Led by Anfisa Polekhina and Alexandra Vaduva, this workshop is part of the one-month Edara × Skergeth pop-up, a curated space shaped by Julia Skergeth and Angelina Gergenreder. While curating the workshops we invited Anfisa the moment she announced her new floristry project on Instagram, even though the account currently has nothing but a logo and not a single flower in sight. Given her track record - she’s a model with an almost suspiciously perfect eye - we trusted the vision. As expected, it did not disappoint.

You’ll choose a vintage vase from their collection, then build a sculptural winter arrangement with seasonal stems, flowers and branches. With the flowers they’re bringing and their guidance, it’s will be impossible to get it wrong - even the least botanical among us will produce something exhibition-ready.

Only 8 spots available - €40.

FEMINIST PERSPECTIVES returns for its fourth edition, now firmly part of Vienna’s film circuit. This year centres on Disability Studies, Crip Culture and inclusive filmmaking, guided by the principle “Nothing about us without us.” The films approach disability as creative practice rather than deficit, offering new ways of looking at bodies, communication and everyday environments.

Many works are made by filmmakers with disabilities or through inclusive processes, making visible how ableism shows up in daily life. Events are fully accessible, with mumok kino providing a barrier-free setting. Organised by dieRegisseur*innen, a cooperative of 120 filmmakers advocating for a more diverse and transparent film culture.

When: Today until 2nd of December
Where: mumok kino

POPCHOP returns with Ausgabe Drei, taking over the ORF Funkhaus for a full-day release gathering that sits somewhere between a cultural fair and a very sociable Saturday. The mix is characteristically broad: food people, art people, music people and the usual crowd who insist they’re “only passing through” but will inevitably definitely still be there several hours later.

The programming is dense and the entire affair runs from noon to 20:00, which caters perfectly to anyone who enjoys feeling they are participating in culture while essentially attending a party with a side of culture.

When: 6 December, 12:00 to 20:00
Where: ORF Funkhaus, Vienna

Freie Kiosk Kultur is back for December, turning the K67 kiosk outside the ORF Funkhaus into a very compact, very charming punschstandl. It runs every Thursday to Sunday, with a rotating cast of guests warming the city one cup at a time: first up is Mafia Tabak.

There’s also the self-declared “smallest Christmas market in the world” displayed in the kiosk window, featuring tufting by Fixiv, jewellery by Felicee Sm, ceramics by Vera Grillmaier, anarchist preserves from Denmark and Freie Kiosk Kultur merch, should you feel compelled to adopt yet another beautiful yet unnecessary item.

Where: In front of ORF Funkhaus, Argentinierstr. 30B
When: Every Thu-Sun in December, Thu & Fri: from 16:00, Sat & Sun: from 12:00

For those who consider culinary pleasure a religion (we count ourselves among them), Wrenkh and Döner Veltliner provide your Sunday service.

They’re calling it Rüya Kahvaltı, dream breakfast, and for once the name isn’t overselling it. Think pişi, çılbır, muhlama and whatever a constellation of etceteras means.

Perfect for when you want to feel comforted and mildly to mediumly (I am aware thats not a word) overfed. As for the man on the poster: none of us can decide if he’s real or AI, but he absolutely has the energy of someone who was who was cast with the brief (wether that was an agency or an AI model) “make him look like a man who would hand you a tea and play a round of dominoes without hesitation.” - we would.

Where: Wrenkh, Bauernmarkt 10, 1010 Wien
When: 7 December

Weingut zum Pranger is opening its doors one final time this year. We were there around the same time last winter, when the Buschen - that bundle of pine branches Heuriger hang out to signal they’re open, not that you’d ever just casually find yourself in Gumpoldskirchen. It should be the perfect escape from Vienna - although, to be fair, the place is now firmly on the radar of the city’s cool kids, so true rural anonymity is not guaranteed.

We mentioned Pranger in one of our earliest Dispatches - back when they hosted that charity art auction at MAK using their own wine bottles as canvases. If you were an early adopter, you already know how much we love their wines and their Leberkässemmel, which remains one of the more convincing arguments for leaving the city limits.

If you’ve never been, this is your sign to plan to take a train to Gumpoldskirchen - but then inevitably end up taking an Uber there instead.

Where: Weingut zum Pranger, Gumpoldskirchen
When: 4 to 7 December

A small circle of friends is opening their Weihnachtswunderkammer for one very charming December evening - which just before Krems an der Donau. Think art, design, wine and enough culinary to make you forget every Christmas market within city limits.

Expect works by Armina Hatic, Mathias Leberbauer, Pauline Marcelle, Benedikt Muxel and Petra von Kazinyan; design from Kintsugi Jewelry, Oneforhundred, Fraanz and Ten-Maya; and wine from some of the region’s best producers. Feuerflecken, Gulasch and cold Czech beer anchor the whole thing.

Christian Tschida returns to O boufés to close out the year, and the restaurant has opted for what can only be described as philosophical as its communication strategy. The poster reads “YOU MIGHT GET DRUNK” — with MIGHT and DRUNK aggressively crossed out, leaving only the stark, unavoidable command: YOU GET. You Get what? Get ready? Get involved? Get lost? Get home safely?

Tschida hardly needs an introduction in this city. Half the natural-wine drinkers in Vienna have a story that begins with “the first time I tried Himmel auf Erden…” and ends somewhere in a completely different Grätzl than planned. Pair that with Konstantin Filippou’s team cooking, plus a 19:00 start time that lets you pretend (briefly) that it’s still a “school night” type outing.

When: 4 December, from 19:00
Where: O boufés, Dominikanerbastei 17, 1010 Wien
Price: €149

We stopped into Furore to catch up with the owner last week because someone told us it wasn’t really a bar, it was a living room with a liquor license - which obviously sparked curiosity. The owner - Yusuf or Habibi as he goes by on Instagram originally from Kirkuk, Iraq - greeted us with the kind of warmth that makes you instantly aware of how unfriendly some Viennese entrances are. He moved here about ten years ago, around the same time I did, and what shocked him wasn’t the weather or the bureaucracy. It was the silence. In his hometown you walk into a café alone and within minutes you’re dragged into a game of dominoes with strangers who insist you stay for “just one more round” In Vienna you walk into a café alone you have the feeling from the other guests you are invisible as it’s polite to give people their ‘privacy’.

Before Furore he ran a Sous Bois Café (almost next door) but the early mornings eventually drained him and he wanted something that felt closer to who he is. So he opened a bar with one clear intention: force people to interact. Not in an artificial way, but subtly - through the layout. One long central table, no opportunity for patrons to sit facing who they came with. He serves only the cocktails he personally loves. No spritzer. No exceptions. If someone walks in with a bad vibe - too drunk, too loud, too something - he simply says they’re full. Furore should feel like a home and you don’t let just anyone into your home. And when you watch him interact with his bartenders, you understand what he means. It’s gentle, respectful, almost familial, the kind of workplace chemistry that can’t be faked.

On the night I had two Negroni Sbagliatos which were genuinely exceptional. By 6PM the bar was already filling. Two large groups booked. Plenty of walk-ins. He told me on New Year’s Eve they’ll open from noon to six, serving drinks and shucking oysters. A very smart idea, in my opinion, because everyone loves a pre-party ritual disguised as “lunch”. Although we can highly recommend securing some form of carbohydrates in parallel or before your next plans; oysters are many things, but a stable foundation for New Year’s Eve they are not.

Somewhere between the second Sbagliato and a philosophical detour, we talked about creativity. About how Furore opened the same month we started HEIMAT. How rare and fulfilling it is to build something you’re genuinely passionate about. “Money is nice,” he said, “but the best part is when someone comes up at the end of the night and says thank you, I had a great evening. That makes my day. That’s better than anything I could earn.” There was no performance in his voice - just sincerity.

He says Vienna is changing too. Softer around the edges, more open, especially because the international crowd keeps widening the city’s emotional bandwidth. Neustiftgasse is changing with it - once quieter - it’s now Burgasse’s younger, cooler sister, full of new openings and interesting people drifting in and out. After leaving Furore I walked two steps to pop into a a booklaunch at Uppers and Downers, which feels perfectly on-brand for the streets now buzzy vibe.

Writing this now, I realise it never felt like a bar visit. It felt more like settling into a friends living room, created to be the place he wished existed when he first arrived in this city.

Since we are all, at this point, aligned and realistic about what December beholds, we won’t have the audacity to recommend an actual workout to you. If you’re looking for discipline, routine or anything resembling self-improvement, you’re on your own - or at one of those gyms that still has the audacity to run bootcamps in Advent. What we can recommend is WeBorn in the 3rd district since we understand wellness is less about fitness and more about sweating out any indulgence they may or may not have occurred.

WeBorn offers guided sauna sessions (structured and mildly ceremonial) - and open sessions where you can bring a friend, sit in the dim setting with the intense heat and discuss all the topics that always appear in December - you know the ones. And if the sauna isn’t quite enough to eradicate the week’s excesses, the ice plunge will finish the job - a brief shock that feels like every questionable decision is being forcibly deleted from your system.

Where: WeBorn, 1030 Wien

Brutal has returned, reopening their once iconic Brutal Kebab, still one of the best modern takes on the classic we have tried, now reborn inside the new Naschmarkt pavilion. The Marktraum’s bright, modern architecture suits them perfectly, and with the team behind Bar Florida and Bistro Fantasy at the helm, the whole thing feels inevitable. Great vibes. Great food.

Where: Naschmarkt Pavilion (Brutal am Markt)

In Praise of Shadows is Tanizaki’s masterpiece, a short book that can read as deeply philosophical when your mind allows it, or, if December burnout has taken hold, as a surprisingly practical set of instructions for fixing your interior lighting. The short book surveys Japanese architecture, lacquerware, paper, food and candlelight - it articulates Tanizaki’s conviction that beauty is shaped by shadow and that unchecked brightness dissolves the gradations that give meaning to a culture. It also hints at a wider lesson, that any art or practice gains depth when it leaves room for ambiguity. Tanizaki praises the “soft sheen” of lacquer bowls that reveal themselves only in dimness, admires the way shadows “invite the imagination,” and reminds us - in one of the book’s most famous lines - that “We find beauty not in the thing itself but in the patterns of shadows,” arguing that certain things (beauty included) only reach their full expression when the light holds itself back.

Read a few pages and you’ll find yourself reconsidering every LED in your apartment. He reflects on how a room becomes more impactful when its corners disappear into darkness, how candlelight makes objects feel alive, how brightness flattens where shadow deepens. Despite being written in 1933, it feels more contemporary than half the design discourse published this year.

And why read in December? In the midst of everything happening in Vienna right now - the openings, the closings, the twelve simultaneous invitations to events and Christmas parties, and the frankly outrageous fact that birthdays are still allowed to occur in December (surely there should be a seasonal moratorium) - you might, if you’re lucky, have the capacity to slow down for a minute. If so, this is the book to do it with.

Because December in Vienna is a month of sensory overload: lights everywhere, events everywhere, people everywhere. In Praise of Shadows steps in as a counterweight - a reminder that beauty doesn’t always require so much spectacle, that softness can be a form of sophistication, and that a little darkness (literal and metaphorical) is sometimes the only way to see things clearly.

Ruby Arabella Wallen tracks the city’s pulse, observes its culture and characters, and works with a small circle of her personal muses to create you a weekly Sunday Dispatch - your blueprint to the week ahead in Vienna.