The Venice Venice Hotel

Dynamic, evocative, audacious and avant-garde begins to describe Venice Venice Hotel, located waterside on the Grand Canal within striking distance of both Rio dei Santi Apostoli and the Palazzo Bollani Erizzo with views over to the Rialto Bridge. Housed in a 13th-century Venetian-Byzantine palace, previously known as Ca’ da Mosto, the hotel is set within one of the oldest palazzos in the city and hallmarks of age are seen, celebrated and beautifully exposed throughout.

Husband and wife team Francesca Rinaldo and Alessandro Gallo, owners of the hotel, founders of clothing and footwear brand Golden Goose and homegrown residents of Venice, wanted the Venice Venice to be an homage to their city, and of course, to the building itself. Its history speaks of a crossroads of discovery from when the palazzo was a trading hub and knowledge-exchange, further compounded in the 17th century Grand Tour when it became a hotel that housed the European wanderers, dreamers, artists and aristocrats that flocked to Venice in search of enlightenment.

A five-year restoration began, with a major rethink needed after the hotel had stood abandoned for decades. With particular attention to the bones of the building, restoration with sensitivity was needed to preserve the soul of the structure, including the Byzantine exterior, brass windows and doors and the original Venetian staircase that was, in fact, dissembled, restored and refitted exactly so.

Rinaldo and Gallo also wanted to create a design hub that would become the zenith of their ideas, a canvas for their own burgeoning art collections, interests and artistic connections within the city and further afield, continuing its legacy as a meeting for minds. Layered onto the heritage features is an eclectic and energetic take on art curation and interior design, showing the owners’ mettle when it comes to multifaceted mediums and the fusing of old and new with tapestries, paintings, photography and sculpture set against the tactile patina of age. A standout must be a mirror frame created from 500-year-old clay sourced from the hotel’s foundations, set to a traditional Venetian style by a modern artist and a soberly lit sculptures by Fabio Viale entitled Souvenir Pietà (Madre) and Souvenir Pietà (Cristo) which act as an introduction to the hotel, sat on a smooth marble plinth against the original stairway, a masterful use of light, tradition and bold creativity.

Today the hotel seems at once classic and comfortable in its heritage finesse, and at the same time rebelliously exciting, a daringly rethought palazzo which is anchored into the world of architecture, creativity, fashion and the art of travel. Rinaldo and Gallo have termed this new wave ‘post-Venetian’, a mantra that looks to the future of Venice, making it one of the most sought-after, hot-ticket addresses for nomads of style on the modern-day Grand Tour.

Forty-two rooms are spread out over the palazzo and in each, contemporary art and photography make a splash, contrasting against the swoon-worthy canal views, requisite gondolas drifting past. Interiors are glamorous and sultry, with large design pieces making their mark: opulent sofas, twin bathtubs alongside one another and sleek lighting.

Venice in Gold stands out, daubed in a colour-match of gold-tinged Basilica di San Marco and Room 43 has mesmerising views of the Grand Canal and Rialto Bridge from your own terrace; whereas the fun begins inside for Room 25, hung with work from Italian photographer Renato D'Agostin. 

Although Venice Venice is very much wrapped up in making new traditions, thankfully some things never change, and at the hotel, sitting canal side at the terrace restaurant is a Venice must-do. Take breakfast here, with a formal breakfast cart to your white table-clothed set-up, where you can pick and choose from the day’s pastries, waffles and fresh fruit or try eggs Benedict with lobster cooked to order. Lunch can be simple but delicious with Venetian cicchetti in the hotel’s uber-cool Venice M’art and pre-dinner is the perfect time (and light) to be seen on the terrace for aperitivo hour.

Dinner sees the terrace and Byzantine palazzo buildings aglow with candlelight, making a memorable spot to sample antipasti of raw seafood, a homemade pasta primi such as Venetian pea risotto, rounded off by creamy tiramisu or the classic crema e biscotti Veneziano.

You could hardly find a more perfect position in Venice, the hotel being canal side and central, allowing for dreamy views and the classic setting of its waterside terrace. Venice Venice sits on the Grand Canal not far from both Rio dei Santi Apostoli and the Palazzo Bollani Erizzo with views over to the Rialto Bridge. You are strolling distance of the sights – the Bridge of Sighs plus St Mark’s Square with Doge’s Palace. Visit the city’s art from inside churches such as Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari with Titian’s Assumption and sculptures by Bellini and Donatello to the Peggy Guggenheim Museum. Murano makes for an interesting day trip – try your hand at glass blowing and pick some finely crafted glassware to bring home.