The Vienna branch of Madame Tussauds opened on Friday at Vienna’s Prater Park, becoming the Europe’s fourth attraction along with London, Amsterdam and Berlin. Visitors have the opportunity to play around 65 wax stars.

A visitor poses with a wax figure of Karl Marx at Madame Tussauds

The preparation of the wax museum took two and half years and it covers an area of some 2,000 square meters, with a total investment capital of 8 million euros (about 11.33 million U.S. dollars). The museum was separated into eight theme halls, including history, musicians, politicians and visionaries, film and sport stars.

The wax museum also opens a wax workshop, providing related wax- making knowledge and the opportunity for visitors to make their own wax hand models.

Sophie Moritzer, marketing and trade sales manager of Madame Tussauds Austria, told reporters that Austria elements had been seriously considered into the preparation, which made the Vienna branch have much more local features. Twenty seven from 65 stars come from Austria from various times, such as the princess Sissi, Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Freud and Schwarzenegger.

The Vienna branch also provides a number of interactive exhibition projects: visitors can play piano with Schubert, join the private party of the king of the Austria-Hungary Empire and the empress Sissi, talk face to face with Austrian Federal President Heinz Fisher. All these creativities greatly arouse visitors’ interest.

Moritzer also said that although a wax figure production usually took four or five months and the production and maintenance costs were extremely high, the Madame Tussauds Austria still allows visitors to take photos and encourage people to play around the stars to feel the hearts of them.

Madame Tussauds was founded by wax sculptor Marie Tussaud in London, which have 11 branches in Europe, Asia and the U.S. It is one of the high-level wax museums in the world. Its wax figures include many worldwide recognized stars. They are certainly true to life that visitors are often hard to tell whether it is true or false. (1 U.S. dollar = 0.7062 euros)

Source: Xinhua