The room is filled with automatic musical instruments – devices that emit sound merely by having them wound up. At the end of the 18th century, music boxes, crank organs, and polyphones were considered luxury products that bespoke the wealth of their owner.

A curious exhibit, the Viennese playing mirror is which plays music when its doors are opened. One theory asserts that the sounds were supposed to discipline a lady vainly admiring herself. Another suggests  that the music was meant to accentuate the moment set aside to attend to matters of beauty, when a woman brushed her hair..

The exhibition is complemented by paintings with musical themes and richly decorated musical instruments – a lute, mandolin, and zithers.