Palazzo Grimani di Santa Maria Formosa

The Palazzo Grimani of Santa Maria Formosa is a State museum, located in Venice in the Castello district, near Campo Santa Maria Formosa.

The palace can be reached by land from Ruga Giuffa. The water entry, very used in ancient times, is located on the San Severo canal. The Palazzo constitutes for the city of Venice a particularly precious novelty for the originality of the architecture, for the decorations and for its history.

The original medieval building was built at the confluence of the canals of San Severo and Santa Maria Formosa, and purchased later by Antonio Grimani, who became a doge in 1521, and subsequently passed on as a legacy, in the third decade of the 16th century, to the grandsons Vettore Grimani, Procurator de Supra for the Venetian Republic, and Giovanni Grimani, Patriarch of Aquileia, who refurbished the old structure inspired by architectural models taken from classicism. The two brothers wanted to give "modern" forms to the building and had it decorated with fresco cycles and elegant stucco. In 1558, at the death of Vettore, Giovanni became the sole owner of the building: he added an extension of the palace.

Decorating the rooms were many artists including Federico Zuccari, architect of the monumental staircase, and Camillo Mantovano. The patriarch Giovanni Grimani set up his refined collection of antiques, including sculptures, marbles, vases, bronzes and gems, in the rooms of the palace. In 1587 he donated the collection of sculptures and gems to the Serenissima: after his death the first ones were placed in the anti-room of the Marciana Library and today they are the founding nucleus of the National Archaeological Museum of Venice.

Until 1865, it was property of the Santa Maria Formosa branch of the Grimani family. But the palace had deteriorated and passed through several owners, until in 1981 it was acquired by the Superintendence for Architectural and Environmental Heritage of the city of Venice and became state property.

Text adapted from “Palazzo Grimani di Santa Maria Formosa” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Palazzo Grimani di Santa Maria Formosa ranks #2,401 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #186 of the 452 mapped in Italy. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 2,382 times in the last 60 days, more than 70% of the atlas. Wikidata records about 56,000 visitors in 2022. 36 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Venice, 1 km away. See how Italy compares in the castle statistics.

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