Hotel Stefanie

A four-star option in the gentrified neighborhood of Leopoldstadt, the Hotel Stefanie is closer to the Schwedenplatz—just over the bridge crossing the Donau Canal—than many Innere Stadt hotels. In operation since 1870, the Stefanie has 120 rooms and is one of three hotels in Vienna owned by the Schick Hotel Group.

The hotel's Viennese restaurant, sleek library, and sleepy courtyard garden speak to the time when the neighborhood wasn't so chic. The staff's attitude still reflects the old Leopoldstadt: ask for a restaurant recommendation in Leopoldstadt, and the concierge is likely to reply "There really isn't much of anything." In actuality, guests are surrounded by new ethnic restaurants and studiously dive-y bars.

Doubles are significantly bigger than the cramped singles. Both are outfitted in a restrained rococo Viennese style (read: lots of orange fabric and wooden accents). Despite the hotel's location on the busy thoroughfare of Taborstrasse, rooms are kept library quiet, mostly because windows open on to the common courtyard below. Bells from the nearby Klosterkirche der Barmherzigen Bruder can be heard every morning and evening.

Note: While breakfast is a plentiful affair, it is a costly €17.