3 days ago
This is Venice's coolest hotel right now
Every time I look at the vaporettos, ambulance boats and bin boats that plough up and down the Grand Canal, I marvel that Venice, a city of 250,000 people, manages to function. It's beautiful, endless proof of the adaptability of the human race, but it's never been cool. In general, Venice is about as hip as an A-level history teacher.
And yet, while I'm eating a plate of gnocchi with ragu for £15 on a terrace opposite the Rialto, I'm somewhere very cool indeed. Venice M'Art occupies the ground floor of the Venice Venice Hotel, which quietly opened a couple of years ago behind the façade of a 13th-century palazzo, the oldest building on the Grand Canal. In the 16th century, Ca' da Mosto became one of Venice's earliest hotels, later hosting Mozart, Voltaire and Byron. By the end of the 20th century, when water breached the ground floor, it was — quite literally — sinking into decay and became derelict.
Then, the husband and wife designers Alessandro Gallo and Francesca Rinaldo — by purchasing ten separate apartments over a number of years — managed to buy the palazzo. The couple, who sold their fashion brand Golden Goose in 2017, had grown up in nearby Mestre. They spent millions more shoring up the building before returning it to a hotel.
Venice is a city that excels in experiential hotels. But Venice Venice — spread over two different buildings — takes it to another level. Arrive in the evening by water taxi at the Grand Canal entrance and the first thing you'll see is a marble sculpture Mother and Son by Fabio Viale, surrounded by (purified!) canal water and lit by the flickering lights of large white candles stationed on the flight of the 25 steps that lead up to the reception.
The rooms — there are just 43 of them — are very fancy indeed. 01 is the only hotel room on the Venetian mainland to have its own private swimming pool. Prosaically named room 35 on the first floor, piano nobile in Italian palazzo speak, has proportions that make its grand piano and a ten-seater dining room table look minuscule, thanks to triple-height ceilings and the vast French windows that lead onto a balcony. This is, at 2,045 square feet, the largest suite in Venice. Mine has frescoes, a terrace and a heart-stopping view, and a poured concrete floor. Venice Venice also houses Gallo and Rinaldo's significant art collection, which includes work by the pioneering artists Christo and Jannis Kounellis.
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A treatment room multi-tasks as an installation by the Romanian artist Victoria Zidaru. The ceiling looks like a giant piece of knitting, but with the linen skeins stuffed with fragrant herbs and dried flowers from her garden, changing with the season. There's also the Bitter Club, with a bar that incorporates speakers. So far, cool but very expensive. Rooms start at £500 a night.
Those staying at Venice Venice generally arrive by water taxi at the Grand Canal entrance but coming by foot, crossing the Ponte Santi Apostoli and ducking through an alleyway, gives an entirely different experiential hit. A set of minimart-style turnstiles lead into a shop. Freezer containers from the 1970s have branded M'Art sweatshirts while special edition Golden Goose trainers are showcased in what was once a fridge. The shelves have Bialetti moka pots branded with the M'Art logo and the hotel's own toiletries, in tins that look like drink cans and metal toothpaste-style tubes.
'When the da Mosto family lived here, the ground floor was always a trading area so it seemed appropriate,' says Bianca Bonaldi, who curates the art and the shop. 'Venice is a city that's always been commerce-driven.'
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Which is true, and in the restaurant, the 15th-century bricks now have vast, glorious, black and white photos of the Venice fishermen and vegetable sellers who provide the food while the waiters wear striped gondolier tops and chinos. It seems almost effortless, which — in my experience — means that lots of effort has gone into it. And indeed like nearly everything in the hotel, the uniforms have been designed by Gallo and Rinaldo.
Unlike most hotels in Venice, it also allows non-guests to come for breakfast, although this costs £55. Dinner too, which is expensive with dishes starting from £25 for risotto and rising to £67 for filetto di manzo alla Rossini, steak with foie gras and truffle.
But lunch is a different matter. Most posh restaurants in Venice close between lunch and dinner, but Venice M'Art has an all-day menu, and compared with most places on the Grand Canal, it's refreshingly good value and delicious. Admittedly, you can spend £25 on a seafood lasagne if you want to, but there are plenty of cheaper options.
Most of Venice's five-star hotels are now run by luxury hotel groups. Next year Rosewood will open in what was formerly the Bauer and Four Seasons is taking over the Danieli. In contrast, Venice Venice, from its mad name to the Venice M'Art branded moka pots and sense of individuality, feels gloriously, robustly Venetian. They named it twice, Bonaldi says, because one day Gallo and Rinaldo may open hotels in other cities, so there might be a Venice Paris or Venice London. Even though I'm in the middle of a love affair with this hotel, I hope they don't.
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Anyway, back to the terrace, which is packed with Venetians. It's opposite the Rialto, and word has got around that this is now the city's best terrace. And the best value one. You can order an £8 toasted sandwich with a £5 spritz and feast on the same view Canaletto painted in 1729 (plus the bin boats and the vaporettos).
There is no barrier between me and the water; something that took much negotiation with the Venice authorities before being allowed but, with the water lapping inches away from me, the result is magical. 'Since we've opened, only one person has fallen in,' Bonaldi says. 'And he wanted to,' she adds.
Perhaps he thought he was being cool. But with its mix of luxury and water-fronted groundedness, it's safe to say that this guest will never be as cool as the Venice Venice Hotel.
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Sarah Turner was a guest of Venice Venice. B&B doubles from £500 ( Fly to Venice
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