Venice, 17 nights, September & October
Oct 3rd, 2018, 05:16 AM
#23
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I think the story of Robin Hood Gardens is very sad, especially since there is now such a shortage of housing for non-millionaires particularly in London. If the authorities had looked after and preserved the estate, I can imagine it being very fashionable now: the Park Hill flats in Sheffield (about which you can find some interesting documentaries) seem well on the way to completing the cycle from highly sought after to being seen as the pits to desirable modern living again.
Last edited by caroline_edinburgh; Oct 3rd, 2018 at 05:18 AM. Reason: Avoid repetition
Oct 3rd, 2018, 03:29 PM
#24
Hi Caroline, I think that you were more taken with the story of Robin Hood Gardens than I was, but you're right that it's a tragedy that the government didn't prioritise maintaining its housing stock for ordinary people who don't have the odd million in their back pockets.
Pete, i did a long post yesterday but somehow it got lost, and now I've forgotten it.
What does your last week have in store?
Pete, i did a long post yesterday but somehow it got lost, and now I've forgotten it.
What does your last week have in store?
Oct 3rd, 2018, 05:41 PM
#25
Peter... thank you so much for these posts. Doubt I'll ever get back to Venice.. so I love feeling that I'm there thru your reports.
I've recently developed a real interest in Australia. Will you be posting when you're back home?
I've recently developed a real interest in Australia. Will you be posting when you're back home?
Oct 4th, 2018, 02:04 PM
#26
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Wednesday October 3rd.
Took a boat trip around the back canals and out into the lagoon with a friend and it was great. The boat was an ex-fishing boat built in Chiogia around 1935, quite lovingly restored and looked after, still able to carry sail. We had the benefit of an outboard motor, so were spared having to talk like pirates, Heave Ho Me Hearties and all that.
We started in the back canals in the north of venice before heading out into the lagoon and it’s interesting. I know my way pretty well around the streets of Venice and I don’t often take advantage of the frequently heard recommendation to just get lost. The canals are a different matter altogether; I have no idea where we went before emerging into the Canal di San Marco near the Arsenal and it was like going through a maze. We often had to back up to let other more important craft like water taxis get through, and our skipper Francesco would let out a piercing whistle at the blind corners.
Once out onto the lagoon, you quickly come to realise just how much Venice is a city made of water, just how vast the lagoon is, and how many islands there are. We motored our way south west past San Servolo, San Lazzaro, the Lazzaretto Vecchio and around Poveglia. Poveglia has been fenced to discourage visitors like us, and the scheme floated a handful of years ago to turn the island into some sort of hotel was surely insane. Sure, San Clemente has been turned into a very up-scale resort type hotel, but it’s doubtful that the tourist trade could support a second such hotel on Poveglia, especially given the island’s sad history. The island was a lazaret for some years, plague sufferers were taken there at one time, and two plague pits are estimated to hold the remains of some 100,000 souls. Later the island was a lunatic asylum, and that closed in 1968.
So a vibrant resort hotel site, well, perhaps not so much.
Coming back to Venice, one can see how busy the south side of Giudecca is, multiple small shipyards, and that is where the fishing fleet get their bottoms scraped and rudders welded up. The vaporetti get slipped in the yards east of San Pietro, along with the vaporetto pontoons. It seems strange to see a bunch of pontoons still labelled Ferrovia or whatever east of Castello.
A bit more architecture, and the Biennale has drawn me all over Venice. Followed up with a couple of spritzes at Paradiso. Sure Quadri and Florians have pride of place (and top billing) in the Piazza, but for an evening drink with sun and a great view, Paradiso can’t be bettered.
Took a boat trip around the back canals and out into the lagoon with a friend and it was great. The boat was an ex-fishing boat built in Chiogia around 1935, quite lovingly restored and looked after, still able to carry sail. We had the benefit of an outboard motor, so were spared having to talk like pirates, Heave Ho Me Hearties and all that.
We started in the back canals in the north of venice before heading out into the lagoon and it’s interesting. I know my way pretty well around the streets of Venice and I don’t often take advantage of the frequently heard recommendation to just get lost. The canals are a different matter altogether; I have no idea where we went before emerging into the Canal di San Marco near the Arsenal and it was like going through a maze. We often had to back up to let other more important craft like water taxis get through, and our skipper Francesco would let out a piercing whistle at the blind corners.
Once out onto the lagoon, you quickly come to realise just how much Venice is a city made of water, just how vast the lagoon is, and how many islands there are. We motored our way south west past San Servolo, San Lazzaro, the Lazzaretto Vecchio and around Poveglia. Poveglia has been fenced to discourage visitors like us, and the scheme floated a handful of years ago to turn the island into some sort of hotel was surely insane. Sure, San Clemente has been turned into a very up-scale resort type hotel, but it’s doubtful that the tourist trade could support a second such hotel on Poveglia, especially given the island’s sad history. The island was a lazaret for some years, plague sufferers were taken there at one time, and two plague pits are estimated to hold the remains of some 100,000 souls. Later the island was a lunatic asylum, and that closed in 1968.
So a vibrant resort hotel site, well, perhaps not so much.
Coming back to Venice, one can see how busy the south side of Giudecca is, multiple small shipyards, and that is where the fishing fleet get their bottoms scraped and rudders welded up. The vaporetti get slipped in the yards east of San Pietro, along with the vaporetto pontoons. It seems strange to see a bunch of pontoons still labelled Ferrovia or whatever east of Castello.
A bit more architecture, and the Biennale has drawn me all over Venice. Followed up with a couple of spritzes at Paradiso. Sure Quadri and Florians have pride of place (and top billing) in the Piazza, but for an evening drink with sun and a great view, Paradiso can’t be bettered.
Oct 5th, 2018, 06:41 AM
#27
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Thursday October 4th.
A pretty laid back start to the day, breakfast at the Ai Artisti, then moving over to the other bar for more coffee in the sun. It’s not common for me to take breakfast al tavolo, I’m more an al banco kind of guy, and it’s interesting just sitting there watching the passing parade. Hard to know where a couple of hours went to, they just seemed to evaporate in the morning sun.
A day more or less strolling around, ventured into the Piazza and then to the Prison for a Chinese / Taiwan architecture thing. Interesting how infill works and buildings have been done, and the social conscience of the architects shines through. Also a display of works by young Latin American architects who are doing good work. Nothing like the architectural monstrosities that mark Brasilia, but much more on a human scale, buildings that blend into the environment, both the natural and social environment. It’s quite exciting stuff.
Gazed into the Olivetti showroom, where there is an exhibition of glass designed by Carlo Scarpa for Venini in the 1930’s. I must confess that I find Scarpa a better architect than I do a glass designer, but then I’m not really across the 1930’s design ethic. Someone, I think James Morris, said once “There is an awful lot of glass in Venice, there is also a lot of awful glass in Venice, much of it of a bilious hue”. Scarpa’s designs don’t really grab me, although one could never say they were awful.
As you face the Piazza from the Olivetti showroom, and then go about four arches to the right, you’d find my personal Venetian talisman, a bronze survey mark about 40mm diameter, let into the Istrian stone that edges the Piazza. The mark indicates the exact axis of the Basilica, finding it each visit seems to bring me good luck.
An evening concert of Baroque music in the Fondaco de Tedeschi and it was good. I am not sure who sponsored it and it was free, and going by the look of the audience, I doubt that too many of the shoppers would have been shopping at the Fondaco on a regular basis.
A chamber orchestra, three violins, a couple of violas, cello, double base and a harpshicord and they gave Baroque music, a couple of pieces that I recognised but can’t name. There were several pieces for orchestra and trumpets, one with flute, another with flute and oboe. The flute and oboe piece was good, the two. Instruments in dialogue with one another. And finally two pieces for orchestra and oboe, and the oboe-ist really let rip. Maybe he is a frustrated jazz player, and he was great.
A pair of Vivaldi (of course) encores to finish a most satisfying evening, and later a glass of prosecco to round it out.
A pretty laid back start to the day, breakfast at the Ai Artisti, then moving over to the other bar for more coffee in the sun. It’s not common for me to take breakfast al tavolo, I’m more an al banco kind of guy, and it’s interesting just sitting there watching the passing parade. Hard to know where a couple of hours went to, they just seemed to evaporate in the morning sun.
A day more or less strolling around, ventured into the Piazza and then to the Prison for a Chinese / Taiwan architecture thing. Interesting how infill works and buildings have been done, and the social conscience of the architects shines through. Also a display of works by young Latin American architects who are doing good work. Nothing like the architectural monstrosities that mark Brasilia, but much more on a human scale, buildings that blend into the environment, both the natural and social environment. It’s quite exciting stuff.
Gazed into the Olivetti showroom, where there is an exhibition of glass designed by Carlo Scarpa for Venini in the 1930’s. I must confess that I find Scarpa a better architect than I do a glass designer, but then I’m not really across the 1930’s design ethic. Someone, I think James Morris, said once “There is an awful lot of glass in Venice, there is also a lot of awful glass in Venice, much of it of a bilious hue”. Scarpa’s designs don’t really grab me, although one could never say they were awful.
As you face the Piazza from the Olivetti showroom, and then go about four arches to the right, you’d find my personal Venetian talisman, a bronze survey mark about 40mm diameter, let into the Istrian stone that edges the Piazza. The mark indicates the exact axis of the Basilica, finding it each visit seems to bring me good luck.
An evening concert of Baroque music in the Fondaco de Tedeschi and it was good. I am not sure who sponsored it and it was free, and going by the look of the audience, I doubt that too many of the shoppers would have been shopping at the Fondaco on a regular basis.
A chamber orchestra, three violins, a couple of violas, cello, double base and a harpshicord and they gave Baroque music, a couple of pieces that I recognised but can’t name. There were several pieces for orchestra and trumpets, one with flute, another with flute and oboe. The flute and oboe piece was good, the two. Instruments in dialogue with one another. And finally two pieces for orchestra and oboe, and the oboe-ist really let rip. Maybe he is a frustrated jazz player, and he was great.
A pair of Vivaldi (of course) encores to finish a most satisfying evening, and later a glass of prosecco to round it out.
Oct 5th, 2018, 12:38 PM
#28
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Friday, October 5th, and the days are flying past, it seems.
An early start for a 7:30 breakfast engagement at the point where Via Garibaldi turns all liquid in Castello, and I’m residing in Santa Croce, nearest vap stop San’ Toma, and a 6:50 vaporetto. But that early vaporetto ride is pretty special, the early travellers are tradesmen with trolleys, not too many people, mostly engaged with the latest tragic news from il Gazzettino, editorial focus mostly centrist miserableness, and it is quiet. There’s something about the early rising mob of people, a sense of calm before they face the day; maybe that’s why racehorses are exercised in the half light of dawn. In any case, the 6:50 No 1 vaporetto ex San’ Toma is worth taking, even if it means you miss the hotel breakfast and I suppose it’s a “real” Venice thing. And anyway, traversing the Grand Canal for a mere breakfast has to be seen as a good thing, and why wouldn’t you ….
So breakfast taken care of, better to move on to the totally trashed Campo Santa Maria Formosa. The latest Spiderman movie (working title “Bosco”) has a scene set there. There is not a single chair upright, the campo filled with rubbish, the fruit and vegetable store upended, tomatoes and bananas everywhere, shop awnings torn, and the whole scene dampened down with fire hoses. Various chunks of stone and brickwork placed strategically, and the whole scene looks like your worst nightmare. About fifty security guys strolling about, just in case some busybody takes to a broom and starts cleaning up, destroying continuity. Total devastation, and meanwhile a drone about the size of a serviceable umbrella hangs overhead, droning away.
There is a bar in Campo S. M. Formosa that we have patronised, against the Rio Paradiso (no relation to the café of the same name in Castello). It is a free standing building, and is closed for the duration of the film shoot, doubtless against some sort of compensation. That bar should be in the movie, historically it served as a mortuary, and for a Spiderman flick, there will surely be multiple cadavers.
Lunch at Cantina Schiavoni (again, don’t dare tell me I’m a creature of habit) and then the Accademia museum where there is a “young Tintoretto” exhibition, 2018 being the 500th anniversary of his birth. It is very well curated, in that besides about 30 works of Tintoretto (I believe he got that nock-name because his father was a textile dyer) there are also works by his contemporary and notable artists of the time. You can see where he is coming from, the growth of a genius. Those early works are full of the exploration of light and action, a bit of a dig into how architectural motifs are used, and you can plainly see how he was on a path to being the painter d’jour of his time.
The Accademia is having work done, yet again, so some rooms are closed. It is predicted that the works will take, per the construction signage, 900 days to be completed. So some of my faves were not on display, faves like the odd Tiepolo, and the St Ursula cycle is being restored also. The care and science that goes into restoration never ceases to amaze me.
Close out the day with a spritz at Paradiso, watching a couple of cruise liners depart. The ship’s company waves with great enthusiasm; I found it in myself to raise my glass to them by at least a millimetre to return the salute.
Dinner at Trattoria de Silvio, spaghetti followed by calimari, and that’s a wrap.
An early start for a 7:30 breakfast engagement at the point where Via Garibaldi turns all liquid in Castello, and I’m residing in Santa Croce, nearest vap stop San’ Toma, and a 6:50 vaporetto. But that early vaporetto ride is pretty special, the early travellers are tradesmen with trolleys, not too many people, mostly engaged with the latest tragic news from il Gazzettino, editorial focus mostly centrist miserableness, and it is quiet. There’s something about the early rising mob of people, a sense of calm before they face the day; maybe that’s why racehorses are exercised in the half light of dawn. In any case, the 6:50 No 1 vaporetto ex San’ Toma is worth taking, even if it means you miss the hotel breakfast and I suppose it’s a “real” Venice thing. And anyway, traversing the Grand Canal for a mere breakfast has to be seen as a good thing, and why wouldn’t you ….
So breakfast taken care of, better to move on to the totally trashed Campo Santa Maria Formosa. The latest Spiderman movie (working title “Bosco”) has a scene set there. There is not a single chair upright, the campo filled with rubbish, the fruit and vegetable store upended, tomatoes and bananas everywhere, shop awnings torn, and the whole scene dampened down with fire hoses. Various chunks of stone and brickwork placed strategically, and the whole scene looks like your worst nightmare. About fifty security guys strolling about, just in case some busybody takes to a broom and starts cleaning up, destroying continuity. Total devastation, and meanwhile a drone about the size of a serviceable umbrella hangs overhead, droning away.
There is a bar in Campo S. M. Formosa that we have patronised, against the Rio Paradiso (no relation to the café of the same name in Castello). It is a free standing building, and is closed for the duration of the film shoot, doubtless against some sort of compensation. That bar should be in the movie, historically it served as a mortuary, and for a Spiderman flick, there will surely be multiple cadavers.
Lunch at Cantina Schiavoni (again, don’t dare tell me I’m a creature of habit) and then the Accademia museum where there is a “young Tintoretto” exhibition, 2018 being the 500th anniversary of his birth. It is very well curated, in that besides about 30 works of Tintoretto (I believe he got that nock-name because his father was a textile dyer) there are also works by his contemporary and notable artists of the time. You can see where he is coming from, the growth of a genius. Those early works are full of the exploration of light and action, a bit of a dig into how architectural motifs are used, and you can plainly see how he was on a path to being the painter d’jour of his time.
The Accademia is having work done, yet again, so some rooms are closed. It is predicted that the works will take, per the construction signage, 900 days to be completed. So some of my faves were not on display, faves like the odd Tiepolo, and the St Ursula cycle is being restored also. The care and science that goes into restoration never ceases to amaze me.
Close out the day with a spritz at Paradiso, watching a couple of cruise liners depart. The ship’s company waves with great enthusiasm; I found it in myself to raise my glass to them by at least a millimetre to return the salute.
Dinner at Trattoria de Silvio, spaghetti followed by calimari, and that’s a wrap.
Oct 5th, 2018, 01:33 PM
#29
Pete, I love the way you find pleasure in the small things that make Venice special - the early vaporetto ride, the mysterious maze of canals explored from the water, the various marks and emblems found on so many of the buildings. Thanks to you I am missing being there a lot.
I got horribly lost in the Accademia last time I was there in July, but when I was looking at the photos on my phone just now, I realised that it was there that I saw the Canova exhibition that I referred to upthread; there were some wonderful busts, one of them Byron I believe but perhaps best of all was the model of Cavona's tomb which I liked a lot more than the full size version in the Frari.
another day, another Spritz - how many more before you go home?
I got horribly lost in the Accademia last time I was there in July, but when I was looking at the photos on my phone just now, I realised that it was there that I saw the Canova exhibition that I referred to upthread; there were some wonderful busts, one of them Byron I believe but perhaps best of all was the model of Cavona's tomb which I liked a lot more than the full size version in the Frari.
another day, another Spritz - how many more before you go home?
Oct 5th, 2018, 01:42 PM
#30
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Ann, I have Saturday, Sunday and Monday, and out at 15:00 on Tuesday, so that’s at least six, maybe more, spritzes.
Sunday AM is a trip to the Lazzeretto Vecchio near the Lido, concert in St Georges on Sunday evening. So there is still a bit to come.
Sunday AM is a trip to the Lazzeretto Vecchio near the Lido, concert in St Georges on Sunday evening. So there is still a bit to come.
