Votive Church (Votivkirche) is 99 meter high. It is the second highest church in Vienna, and one of the most important neo-Gothic sacred buildings in the world.
After an assassination attempt on Franz Joseph in 1853, the monarch's brother commissioned this church to give thanks for saving the life of the emperor. In 1854 a project by the 26 year old architect Heinrich von Ferstel was chosen as the design. He decided to build the cathedral in the neo-Gothic style, borrowing heavily from the architecture of Gothic French cathedrals.
The church was dedicated in 1879 on the silver anniversary of Emperor Franz Joseph and his wife Empress Elisabeth.

The Votivkirche has the typical form of a Gothic cathedral :

-a façade with two slimline towers and three gabled portals with archivolts and a gallery with statues above the portals,
-central portal twice as wide as the side portals
-a rose window, crowned by the roof gable of the nave
-belfries and a transept spire
-buttresses, abutments and flying buttresses

The church has undergone extensive renovations after being badly damaged during World War II.