Phänomen Goldhaube: Wissenschaftliches Symposion

At the symposium in the ballroom, the focus is not only on the gold bonnet as an elaborate traditional headdress, but also on the women’s charity movement that emerged under its banner, as well as the symbolic significance of the headdress for Upper Austria.

*Mit Goldhauben auf dem Weg* is the title of the large-format pencil drawing by Peter Hauenschild and Georg Ritter from 1990, which depicts a phenomenon that has been a part of Upper Austria for several hundred years now. It was not until the end of the dress codes (1750) that middle-class women were also able to display their personal wealth through their clothing and head coverings. A culture of gold bonnets spread throughout Central Europe in a wide variety of forms and styles. Thanks to travel writers, the “beautiful woman of Linz” with her magnificent bonnet became a symbol of the beauty of Linz’s women. From the mid-19th century onward, gold bonnets disappeared from the public landscape of Upper Austria, only to reappear a few decades later—now as distinct groups—thanks to efforts to preserve and revive the tradition. Particularly around 1900, during the interwar period, and after World War II, women wearing gold bonnets—and later, groups of them—became a symbol of Upper Austria. In addition to their representative role, they increasingly took on charitable responsibilities.