Vienna Opera Ball with Wannabe Princess and many celebrities

Austria’s high society gathered for a lavish festival without the social lion Richard Lugner at the Vienna Opera Ball. On Thursday evening, the star guest from Hollywood once paid by Lugner was missing, but numerous asterisks in extravagant and elaborate evening gear were missing.

For decades, the Viennese entrepreneur Lugner, who died in 2024, had led illustrious guests such as Kim Kardashian, Sophia Loren or Grace Jones on the Austrian state ball. He thus attracted international attention for the event and advertised his shopping center.

Among the guests this year was the model Leni Klum (20) in an elegantly cut, glittering-brown dress.

Lugner’s daughter Jacqueline also came to the opera ball on Thursday evening. In her lodge she symbolically left a chair. “He left a huge gap and he will miss many people,” she said in front of the ball. The daughter came accompanied by the New York’s artist Alec Monopoly, who had sprayed a large graffito from Lugner on his shopping center the day before.

Richard Lugner’s sixth and last wife Simone also visited the Waltz Festival. The two had married last June. Lugner died at the age of 91 at the end of August. “It is difficult,” said Simone Lugner about her visit to the ball without Richard Lugner. He was a support for her. “Now it just lacks,” she told ORF. The widow was accompanied by her husband’s ex-chauffeur.

Several small demonstrations of left -wing groups took place outside the state opera. Your mottos: “Wealth for everyone!” Or “the rich dance – we protest against the unjust distribution”.

The approximately 5,200 guests of the opera ball celebrated against the background of an economic crisis and a very increased prices in Austria. The ball is not for narrow wallets. Tickets cost 395 euros. A seat is not yet included – at least 160 euros are to be paid for.

If you really want to see and be seen, you can book a lodge for a price of up to 25,500 euros. Part of the income is donated to social aid organizations. Last year it was more than 400,000 euros.

Not only Leni Klum was invited to these lodges, but also a model and “super talent” juror Bruce Darnell (67). “In this extraordinary time it is important to celebrate art and culture,” he told ORF.

British actor Ed Westwick (“Gossip Girl”), the German singer Sasha and the German model Franziska Knuppe also came to the ball.

This year the opera ball was not only marked by crises, but also of terrorist attacks and threats. In January, an offshoot of the Islamic State terror network issued the Viennese ball season as a target. The Ministry of the Interior therefore increased the security measures and used hundreds of civil servants to protect the ball guests.

You can see how it else is on Viennese balls here.