Vienna Hofburg - Imperial Apartments, Sisi Museum, Silver Collection

The young empress begins to suffer from insomnia, a lack of appetite and a persistent cough. As a preventative measure against lung disease her doctors recommend that she is sent to Madeira. For the first time Sisi is again free of any obligations and can enjoy life far from the stifling constraints of the court. When Elisabeth returns to the Viennese court after an absence of two years, a profound transformation has taken place. The once graceful but shy and melancholic young girl has become a self-confident, proud beauty. This is the period in which the famous portraits by Franz Xaver Winterhalter were painted. The most famous of this series, painted in 1865, is without doubt the portrait displayed here which shows Elisabeth wearing a ballgown known as the “star dress” together with the famous diamond stars in her hair. Elisabeth owned a set of 27 diamond stars, some of which she later bequeathed to her granddaughter, Archduchess Elisabeth, daughter of Crown Prince Rudolf. The glass stele conta