Ferdinand Habsburg Would Have Been King. Instead He’s a Racecar Driver.

“I have friends,” he says, and these friends include the owner of a natural wine bar, a painter and a puppeteer for an opera.

‘I Gotta Live Differently’

Of course, the complex reality is that the most traumatic event for his family – the loss of the empire – is what he loves most: freedom.

“My grandfather, he was the last crown prince – he had to grow up with his father as emperor and his mother as empress,” Mr Habsburg said. “As a child, he had to train and learn 10 languages, and work hard to be a royal. It was all the events and openings and hospital visits.

“I’m very proud of my family and what they’ve done,” he said. “But I can live differently.”

Mr. Habsburg was born in Salzburg, Austria, to Mr. von Habsburg, a politician, and Francesca von Thyssen-Bornemisza, an art collector and curator. His parents are divorced; father, 62, lives in Vienna and Porto, Portugal, and mother, 64, lives in Madrid. In addition to his roommate Gloria, a documentary film producer, Mr. Habsburg has another sister: Eleonore Habsburg D’Ambrosio, 29, a jewelry designer who lives in Oxford, England, with her husband Jérôme D’Ambrosio, a former Formula E driver.

Habsburgs – there are about 600 of them alive today, he said – try to keep in touch. “We have a WhatsApp group,” Mr Habsburg said. “I can travel anywhere in the world, and I send a message to the group and tell them where to go and when, and there’s a house where they can stay.” He added with a laugh, “It’s like a free Airbnb for us Habsburgs.”