Kitchen
Livingroom
Bedroom 1
Bedroom 2
Bathroom 1
Bathroom 2
The Area of Castello
The City of Venice is divided into 6 municipal districts, called Sestieri.
Castello is the largest and most varied of the Sestieri, named after the long gone fortifications on the island of San Pietro,
where since the 8th Century was located the seat of the bishop of Venice. It stretches from St. Mark’s Square out to the east-ernmost section of the city.
The establishment of the naval dockyard at the start of the 13th Century was crucial to the area’s development , and still today a large part of the district
is occupied by the Arsenale, the largest naval complex in Europe, which stands behind it’s high towers like a forbidden city within a city.
Large intervention in the area were made at the time of the Napoleonic domination of Venice, with the creation of a vast park area with public gardens,
today the location for the Biennale Contemporary art Exhibit, and the opening of the Via Eugenia, today known as Via Garibaldi, a very typical Venetian area with many shops
and good restaurants.
Behind the waterfront the area is unequally quiet, characterized by narrow alleys, elegantly faded palazzo and fine churches.
WHAT YOU SHOULD SEE IN CASTELLO
Campo San Giovanni e Paolo
The majestic Dominican church of San Giovanni e Paolo stands right by the former Scuola Grande di San Marco, one of the several laymen confraternity of Venice,
a unique majestic early Renaissance building.
Campo Santa Maria Formosa
A lively square with a market, the elegant Renaissance church of Santa Maria Formosa and a handful of beautiful Gothic and Renaissance palaces.
Campo San Zaccaria
A small square, right by St Mark’s, with an outstanding early Renaissance church containing one of Giovanni Bellini’s masterpiece, and many other Gothic and Renaissance paintings .
San Giorgio dei Greci
The center of the thriving Greek Community, where you can find the museum of Byzantine Icons and the Orthodox 16th Century church of San George of the Greeks
San Giorgio degli Schiavoni
The headquarter of the Dalmatian community containing ten masterpieces by Carpaccio painted at the beginning of 1500. One of the two old confraternities survived to Napoleon
Churches of San Giovanni in Bragora and la Pietà
Two churches related with Antonio Vivaldi. San Giovanni in Bragora was where Vivaldi was Baptized and where the original Baptism certificate
is still preserved. La Pietà still today holds concert of Vivaldi’s music, and it’s attached to a charity hospital for orphan girls where Vivaldi
was chorus-master and violin teacher between 1704 and 1738.
San Francesco della Vigna
A slice of the Renaissance lost in a remote and tired square dominated by the church of San Francesco with a temple façade built by Palladio in bright white stone of Istria.
The Great Gateway of the Arsenale
Probably Venice’s first Renaissance structure dating 1460, it is the entrance to a protected naval base where Venice’s fleet was built, maintained and refitted
for each voyage. All its provisions and equipment were stored here, as was its artillery. The Arsenale holds a unique place in the History of the pre-Industrial Revolution.
The Biennale
In the area of the public gardens stand the pavilions of the various countries which participate to the international exhibit of Contemporary Art,
one of the most successful and famous Art events in the world.