ORF long museum night
The ORF Long Night of Museums is one of Austria’s most beloved annual cultural events — a single long evening each autumn when museums, galleries, exhibition spaces and cultural institutions across the entire country open their doors with special programmes, extended hours and a single combined admission ticket valid at all participating venues from 6pm to 1am. In the Salzkammergut and its surrounding region, the Long Night is an opportunity to discover cultural treasures that would otherwise require multiple separate visits: the World Heritage Museum in Hallstatt, the City Museum in Bad Ischl, the Lentos in Linz and many more are all part of the programme.
The special programmes organised for the Long Night go well beyond simply extending opening hours. Museums typically offer guided tours at times or to areas not normally accessible, invite visiting speakers and artists to present special performances or talks, and create experiences designed specifically for the occasion. The result is a cultural evening of unusual richness and variety — the chance to encounter familiar institutions in new ways, and to discover less-familiar places that the Long Night brings to wider attention for the first time.
The combined ticket means that the evening can be shaped entirely according to personal interest — moving between venues by taste rather than by timetable, spending long periods in places of particular appeal and passing quickly through others. In Linz alone, the number of participating venues is extraordinary: from the Ars Electronica Center to the Schlossmuseum, from the Lentos to smaller specialist collections, the city rewards systematic exploration during the Long Night. In Bad Ischl and the Salzkammergut, the scale is more intimate but no less rewarding.
For guests of Hallstatt Hideaway, the Long Night of Museums is an opportunity to explore the remarkable cultural landscape of the Salzkammergut region in a uniquely festive and concentrated way. Whether focusing on the immediate local area or making the short drive to Linz or Salzburg for the evening, the Long Night opens doors that illuminate the depth and variety of Austrian cultural life. Starting or ending the evening at the World Heritage Museum in Hallstatt itself, just steps from the Hideaway, is a particularly natural and rewarding choice.
