Palazzo Venart

Palazzo Venart is the kind of Venetian hotel that makes no sense anywhere else. In Santa Croce, a few steps from the Grand Canal, this sixteenth century palazzo hides behind greenery and a gate, with only eighteen rooms inside. Its former name, Palazzo Bacchini delle Palme, feels almost more useful than the hotel name: it explains the palms, the private garden and the slightly faded aristocratic mood better than any star rating could.

Inside, restraint has not been invited. There are marble floors, leaded glass, frescoed ceilings, velvet, brocade, carved furniture and bathtubs placed with excellent confidence. Some rooms are named after Venice’s most marketable ghosts, from Titian and Casanova to Marco Polo and Byron. That sounds touristy on paper, yet the place survives it because the setting is real. You know you are in Venice before you have opened the curtains.

Still, the reason to book may well be dinner. GLAM, led by Enrico Bartolini and Donato Ascani, holds two Michelin stars and turns the hotel from romantic palazzo into culinary address. Its menu, with art, gardens and lagoon as its vocabulary, is precise, botanical and unmistakably Venetian. Stay here for the quiet, the garden and the pleasure of walking upstairs after one of the city’s most polished meals. The hotel is charming. The restaurant gives it purpose.