Giardini Reali di Venezia, Venice

Giardini Reali di Venezia is a park threaded into the space between Piazza San Marco and the San Marco basin. Its story begins with Napoleon’s plan to reshape the Marciana area: in 1806, Giovanni Antonio Antolini prepared designs for a royal residence with gardens on land occupied by the Granai di Terra Nova, a building dating to 1340 that had housed grain trading and small shops. Under Austrian rule, the grounds gained a glasshouse and a neoclassical Coffee House by Lorenzo Santi, built between 1815 and 1817.

An iron pergola later became a defining element of the garden’s architecture. The gardens opened fully to the public on 23 December 1920. After a long period of neglect, Paolo Pejrone directed their restoration, and they reopened in September 2020.