Innsbruck's first design hotel, opened 2002 above the Rathaus-Galerie at Adolf-Pichler-Platz, 92 rooms with sound-proofed windows, walk-in showers and bathrobes, and the 5th Floor rooftop bar that turned the Old Town's flat-roof skyline into a north-facing terrace for the Nordkette ridge above.
"The most consequential hotel decision in the Tirolean capital in a quarter century, the city built itself a contemporary four-star directly into the new town hall in 2002, and twenty-four years later the 5th Floor terrace is still the only address in Innsbruck where the Nordkette ridge sits across your breakfast table."
The Penz opened in 2002 inside the then-new Rathaus-Galerie complex, the contemporary glass-and-stone redevelopment of the Innsbruck town hall block that Austrian architect Dominique Perrault designed to slot a shopping arcade, civic offices and a 92-room hotel into a single envelope on Adolf-Pichler-Platz, three minutes' walk from the Goldenes Dachl. The Penz family had run Innsbruck restaurants for two generations before that; the hotel was their first city-centre property and the first proper design hotel in the Tirolean capital. Twenty-four years on it is still the city's clearest answer to the question of where to stay for design-literate travellers who want to walk to dinner in the Old Town.
The 92 rooms run across four floors above the Rathaus-Galerie atrium and were refurbished in stages through 2018, 2022. The standard categories are smaller than the contemporary four-star average, sound-proofed windows, walk-in rain showers, dressing gowns and bathrobes, Italian Penz-house furniture, flat-screen satellite TV, but every room has the substitute that matters in Innsbruck: a writing desk under a window that frames either the Nordkette range to the north or the Patscherkofel to the south. The Junior Suites on the upper floors add a private balcony or terrace; the corner Penz Suites add a separate sitting room. Climate control was retrofitted across the building in the 2021 refurbishment, which matters in July when Innsbruck regularly clears thirty degrees.
The 5th Floor, the rooftop American bar and breakfast restaurant on the top of the building, is the property's signature. It runs as the morning room from seven, the lunch venue for the Old Town business crowd, and the city's most consistently busy after-work cocktail bar from six. Two terraces wrap the corner, one facing the Nordkette and one facing the Maria-Theresien-Strasse axis south to the Patscherkofel. There is no destination restaurant on site, the Penz family deliberately steered guests into the Old Town's working dining rooms (Stiftskeller, Goldenes Dachl, Sitzwohl) rather than competing with them, but the 5th Floor's breakfast is one of the most efficient morning rooms in the Tirol.
The position is decisive for what the hotel is and is not. The Goldenes Dachl is 350 metres on foot through Maria-Theresien-Strasse; the Hofkirche and the Tiroler Landesmuseum are five minutes; the Hungerburgbahn (the Zaha Hadid-designed funicular up the Nordkette) is a ten-minute walk; the Innsbruck Hauptbahnhof is seven minutes by tram or twelve on foot. For business travellers there is no closer four-star to the courts, the Landhausplatz government buildings, or the Universität Innsbruck. The Penz is not a wellness or a ski hotel, there is no spa, no pool, but for the city break, for the business stop, and for the design-conscious solo traveller, it remains Innsbruck's most considered city address.
For Innsbruck business stays The Penz is the obvious choice, Innsbruck's only contemporary four-star design hotel within three minutes' walk of the Landhausplatz government buildings, the courts, and the Universität Innsbruck Hauptgebäude. The 5th Floor at breakfast handles the morning prep meetings; the same room at six handles the after-work debrief. Sound-proofed windows over the pedestrianised Maria-Theresien-Strasse mean genuinely quiet sleep on a working week.
Innsbruck is the rare Alpine capital that works as a solo break: an Old Town small enough to walk in two hours, a funicular and two cable-cars from the city centre to two-thousand-metre ridges, and an after-dinner culture that doesn't require company. The Penz's design-hotel format, single rooms with proper desks, the 5th Floor bar that doesn't read as a couples room, the central position, makes it Innsbruck's most considered solo address.
For a contemporary Innsbruck anniversary weekend, paired with dinner at Sitzwohl or the Stiftskeller, a Hungerburgbahn evening on the Nordkette, and a morning at the Tiroler Landesmuseum, a Penz Suite on the upper floor with a Patscherkofel-facing terrace is the city's most considered booking. The hotel doesn't try to be a romantic property; it lets the city be the romance and stays out of the way.
Adolf-Pichler-Platz 3
6020 Innsbruck
Austria
Goldenes Dachl 350 m on foot; Hauptbahnhof 7 min by tram; Innsbruck Airport 12 min by taxi; Hungerburgbahn 10 min on foot
92 rooms (incl. Junior & Penz Suites)
Standard Doubles from €240/night
Junior Suites from €340/night
Penz Suites from €480/night
Rates lower outside ski season
Check-in: 3:00 PM
Check-out: 12:00 PM
Opened 2002; Penz family ownership; rolling refurbishment 2018, 2022
5th Floor rooftop American bar & breakfast
Two rooftop terraces (Nordkette / Patscherkofel)
Free WiFi throughout
Climate control in all rooms
Underground parking (Rathaus-Galerie)
Sound-proofed windows
From €240/night. Ski-season weekends (late December through early March) book six weeks ahead; book three months ahead for Bergiselspringen (the four-hills ski-jumping weekend in early January).
Book This Hotel →The 1390 Old Town inn near the Goldenes Dachl that hosted Mozart, Goethe and Sartre, now 43 modern rooms.
The Penz family's larger 2017 sister property on Maria-Theresien-Strasse, 120 rooms with spa and sauna.
The 1620 castle hotel above the Inn valley at Vomp/Schwaz, 39 rooms across castle and estate buildings.