Aman Venice – a Renaissance palazzo with a garden on the Grand Canal

Halfway between the Rialto and Accademia bridges, on the San Polo bank of the Grand Canal, a white Renaissance palace stands with two obelisks on its roofline. Palazzo Papadopoli was finished around 1570 for the Coccina family, and in 2013 it became Aman Venice, the group's first hotel in Italy. Inside there are only 24 rooms and suites, almost all of them looking over the canal, and among them Tiepolo frescoes, a Sansovino fireplace, silk on the walls and Murano glass overhead. Jean-Michel Gathy kept the frescoes and gilding and set calm, contemporary furniture against them. What makes the palazzo rare in Venice, though, is outdoors: two private gardens, one of them on the water. Most guests arrive by boat at the palazzo's own landing. The MICHELIN Guide gives Aman Venice three Keys, its highest distinction, and calls it Aman's only city hotel in Europe.

This is how the palace works as a hotel today – which rooms to ask for, where to eat and drink, and how to use the gardens.

01The palazzo

The architect Giangiacomo dei Grigi built the palace for the Coccina, a Bergamo family newly admitted to the Venetian patriciate. In the 18th century Giandomenico Tiepolo painted frescoes on the piano nobile. In the 19th century it was bought by the brothers Niccolò and Angelo Papadopoli, bankers and counts whose family came from Corfu; Angelo acquired the neighbouring buildings to make room for a garden and a new wing. In the 1870s Michelangelo Guggenheim and the painter Cesare Rotta remodelled the interiors, and in 1922 the palace passed by inheritance to the Arrivabene Valenti Gonzaga family.

From the water entrance a staircase climbs two floors to the piano nobile, the grandest level of any Venetian palazzo. The former ballroom is now a lounge with a balcony over the canal, and on the fourth floor are the Salon, a games room named after Tiepolo and a library of antique books from Count Arrivabene's own collection.

02Rooms and suites

No two rooms are alike. The Rooms begin at 47 square metres: the Palazzo Bedrooms look down into the private garden, the Chamber Affresco has original frescoes, the Chamber Luminoso faces south-east into the light, and the Palazzo Stanzas Canal Grande, from 57 to 89 square metres, look onto the canal and the garden terrace.

Insider tip

The Palazzo Kitchen Table has only eight seats and one sitting, Tuesday to Saturday – book it with the room.

The Signature Rooms have ceilings of up to five metres. The Sansovino Stanza keeps its 16th-century fireplace, wood panelling and carved ceilings; the Maddalena has frescoed ceilings, silk walls and a chandelier in the bathroom; the Papadopoli frames its fireplaces and frescoes with views of the garden terrace and the canal. Of the suites, the Grand Canal Suite has a separate sitting room full of canal light, and the Alcova Tiepolo Suite is 18th-century Rococo throughout, with Tiepolo frescoes, gilded doors and ceilings. Families and longer stays can take one of two three-bedroom apartments: the Coccina's Apartment, which fills the whole fourth floor, or the Grand Canal Apartment in its own wing.

03Where to eat

Arva, Aman's Italian restaurant, cooks what it calls harvest cuisine: pastas, risottos, Adriatic fish, meat and small plates inspired by Venetian cicchetti, built on produce from in and around the lagoon. It serves from noon to 22.00, with dinner from 19.00, and a Sunday brunch from 11.00 to 16.00. In warm weather the tables move into the Grand Canal Garden, with its own outdoor bar, and the gondolas glide past.

For something more intimate, the Palazzo Kitchen Table seats eight around a teppanyaki-style counter. The executive chef, Matteo Panfilio, cooks a ten-course menu of Veneto produce – violet artichokes from Sant'Erasmo, herbs from Cavallino, lagoon and Adriatic seafood – using Italian and Japanese techniques, at one seating at 19.30 from Tuesday to Saturday. Afternoon tea is served daily from 15.00 to 17.00, under the frescoes in winter and beneath the wisteria in summer.

04The Bar

The Bar occupies the Red Room on the piano nobile, once the Salone Galleria where the Papadopoli showed their paintings. Cesare Rotta's vast fresco of Olympus covers the ceiling, and the stuccoes celebrate music, literature, astronomy and navigation. The bar manager, Antonio Ferrara, writes seasonal cocktail lists – the signature menu takes its cues from the palazzo's six principal halls and is bound in Rubelli fabric – served with cicchetti and light dishes. It is open daily from noon to midnight, and in the warmer months drinks move out into the garden.

05Aman Spa

The spa is tucked into a third-floor mezzanine, reached by its own staircase, with three softly lit treatment rooms, each with a dressing area and bathroom. Treatments draw on Asian healing traditions and on Italy's own spa culture, using the mineral-rich waters, thermal salts and clays of Salsomaggiore Terme for baths, wraps and scrubs. There is a fitness studio with views over the rooftops, and from 1 October 2026 the spa is open daily from 14.00 to 20.00.

06Making the most of a stay

Ask for a room on the canal side if the view is the point, or a garden room if quiet matters more. Book the Kitchen Table early – eight seats go quickly – and keep one long, slow evening for dinner in the garden. The concierge arranges private tours of the city and lagoon by boat, and Piazza San Marco is a short walk away. From Marco Polo airport the hotel's transfer takes about 50 minutes, by car to the mainland dock and then by water taxi. Check-in is from 15.00 and check-out at noon.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.