Hotel Santo Stefano, Venice

Housed in a fifteenth century watchtower, the Hotel Santo Stefano looks out across one of Venice’s sunniest and best-known squares, five minutes from Piazza San Marco. Extensive restructuring, the latest carried out just recently, has converted the original building into a refined hotel rich in atmosphere, with elegant rooms, each with a bathroom decorated with marble mosaics and equipped with Jacuzzi and Turkish bath.

Hotel Santo Stefano is housed on the five floors of a high narrow building which, back in the fifteenth century, was the watchtower of an ancient monastery. Thorough rebuilding has created a refined and atmospheric hotel which, making skilful use of the limited space available, offers a splendid hall decorated with Carrara marble plus a panelled ceiling decorated with frescoes. A lift and bar complete the services of this hotel with its typically Venetian atmosphere.

The furnishings of the rooms display elegance and charm, wall drapes, gilded mirrors, decorated furniture, Frau beds, lamps made, courtesy of Barovier & Toso, from Murano glass, period paintings lit as in a museum, all according to eighteenth century Venetian taste. Most of the rooms look out over the ‘campo’ (or square), where comfortable armchairs enable our guests to take breakfast outside during the summer months in the space and greenery reserved for the hotel.

All the rooms are air-conditioned and equipped with every comfort: satellite tv, cable tv, DVD, telephone with a direct line, minibar, air-conditioner, electronic safe, hair-dryer. Each room has a Jacuzzi water-massage and Turkish bath. Breakfast is served both in the room and on the terrace.

Campo Santo Stefano, one of the largest and sunniest squares in the city, once hosted dances, bullfights and the festivities of the Venice Carnival. Nowadays it is an animated atmospheric venue for either walks or meetings, with its cafes where one can stop and savour a journey back through time such as only Venice can give. The location then is as central as one could wish: the Academy and Palazzo Grassi are virtually at your doorstep. Piazza San Marco and the Rialto are only a little further away, both being reachable in five minutes.