Palazzina Grassi
Through the looking glass
A stroll from San Marco
Palazzina Grassi in Venice's San Marco district is a sultry, saturnine Starck hotel ferreted away behind a 16th-century façade by the Grand Canal, with a champagne bar, decadent atmosphere and terrace-toting suites.
Facilities
Rooms
Twenty-five, including one rooftop suite, four Grand Canal-view suites and three family suites.
Checkout
Noon, but flexible until 3pm if the room’s available. Earliest check-in, 2pm.
More Details
Rates usually include an à la carte breakfast (€50 a person), with juice, hot drinks and a basket of freshly made bread and pastries; the à la carte breakfast menu includes the likes of eggs benedict and French toast with seasonal berries, from €14.
Also
Staff can arrange a host of authentic Venetian experiences – from insider city tours to cooking classes from a countess.
Free Internet Access
Laundry
Pet Friendly
Room Service
At the Hotel
Members- and residents-only Krug champagne lounge; private landing pier; roof terrace (open in season); free WiFi throughout; full concierge service. In rooms: Starck fixtures and fittings, backlit mirror walls, programmable lighting, in-mirror LCD TV, minibar and coffee machine.
Our Favourite Rooms
The Junior Suite with Terrace category has a terrace overlooking the city’s rooftops. There’s an exclusive feel to the third-floor Suite: you can only get there by private elevator. Its terrace has sweeping Venice vistas, and you can get an eyeful of cityscape from the bed. Grassi’s smallest rooms, the Superiors, aren’t spacious, but the pale colour scheme and hall-of-mirrors effect gives the impression of size.
Packing Tips
Mrs Smiths, free up some handbag space and leave the compacts behind: there are 286 mirrors in this hotel. And remember to pack your most comfortable shoes: Venice is a city made for strolling.
Also
Check-in can be in your room or in the lounge bar.
Children
Cots are free for under-3s, but extra beds for older kids cannot be provided. A local nanny can be called upon for babysitting services (on request and for an additional charge).
Gallery
Food & Drink
Top Table
People-watch from a perch at the bar, or sit at the long table by the show kitchen to watch the chefs at work.
Dress Code
Rich, ducal fabrics: velvet, cashmere and damask.
Hotel Restaurant
Meals are served pretty much anywhere, but the main dining area is in Palazzina the Restaurant, where there’s an open kitchen. The menu places simplicity and the quality of ingredients above fussiness and show-off flourishes.
Hotel Bar
PG’s is a mood-lit mahogany cocktail den of exposed brick, velvet and leather; 15th-century pillars prop up the bars, and candles flicker in glimmering Murano-glass holders. Guests also get access to the Krug Lounge, a sultry, scarlet-carpeted ‘champagnerie’.
Last Orders
Breakfast can be served between 7.30am and noon; and lunch is available from noon until 2.30pm; and dinner is from 7pm until 10.30pm.
Room Service
In-room meals can be whipped up in the kitchens until midnight, after which a smaller, night menu kicks in. You can have food and drink brought to you anywhere you wish.
Planes
Venice’s Marco Polo Airport is 16km away. This bustling mini-hub handles a range of flights from Europe, the Middle East and the US – and it's easy to reach the city from here. Approach Venice by crossing the lagoon: board an Alilaguna ferry (www.alilaguna.it) at the airport harbour – the Linea Arancio (orange line) takes you to the Sant'Angelo stop, just a few minutes' walk from the hotel, in around 40 minutes. Buy tickets ahead online, or from a ticket machine in the Arrivals hall. Alternatively, take a water taxi to the San Samuele stop, just a hundred yards from the hotel entrance - a private water taxi can be arranged at the airport for €120 for up to four people; or the hotel can arrange private luxury transfers on request (€180 each way: a luxury car transfer between the airport and the harbour, then a private water taxi). You might also consider arriving into Treviso Airport (www.trevisoairport.it), just 26km away, with a direct bus (www.atvo.it) link to Piazzale Roma in the city.
Trains
There are two main stations – Santa Lucia on the Canal, and Mestre on the mainland – both have excellent links across the country and beyond, via Trenitalia (www.trenitalia.com), including Rome, Milan and Paris; Verona is just one hour away. The Santa Lucia train station is 2.5km from the hotel: a water taxi can set sail to here (for €85), and from the station you can catch a vaporetto – on line two, to the San Samuele stop – to the hotel.
Automobiles
Unless you want to lock them up on an artificial island or long-stay carpark, leave the cars at home. The hotel is in the centre of Venice, where waterways rule, not roads.
Worth Getting Out of Bed For
You're perfectly positioned here, yards from the San Samuele vaporetto stop and an enjoyable stroll from both the Rialto (to your north) and the Piazza San Marco (to your east). Right next door to the hotel, the neoclassical Palazzo Grassi has been transformed into a contemporary exhibition space by Gucci/Christie’s billionaire François Pinault. His own extraordinary collection is housed here and in the Punta della Dogana on the opposite bank. The 13th-century Santo Stefano church is in the neighbourhood, too. Short on time and no idea where to begin? Cross the canal via the Ponte dell'Accademia for a whirlwind art tour of Dorsoduro: the jewels of the Venetian Renaissance are displayed in the Accademia (including Giorgione's moving La Veueve); and a cherry-picked selection of modern masterpieces (including Picassos, Pollocks, Mondrians and more) illuminate Peggy Guggenheim's intimate former home at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection.
Earn or Redeem Points with World of Hyatt
This Mr & Mrs Smith hotel participates in the World of Hyatt loyalty program. As a member, you can earn and redeem points and enjoy exclusive benefits for qualifying nights. .
