Hotels near Ca' Rezzonico

Baldassare Longhena began this palace in 1649 and had it up to the first floor by 1661, then work stopped for decades. The Rezzonico family bought the unfinished shell in 1750 and put Giorgio Massari on it; the Grand Canal facade was completed between 1750 and 1752 and the interiors were close to done by 1756. The city of Venice bought the building in June 1935 and turned it into the Museum of Eighteenth-Century Venice.

That is the exact century every Carnival costume on the street outside is imitating. Pietro Longhi's small canvases upstairs show Venetians in bauta and tricorn doing thoroughly unglamorous things, including the crowd that queued to see Clara the rhinoceros when she was exhibited in Venice in 1751. Giambattista Tiepolo ceilings sit above them, and the reconstructed pharmacy and the covered gondola fill out the picture of how the clothes were actually lived in. Seeing the garments in their own rooms rather than on a hire-shop rail changes what you notice back outside.

Winter hours run 10:00 to 17:00 from November to March with Tuesday as the closing day, and the last published admission was 10 euros full, 7.50 euros reduced for under-25s, over-65s and Rolling Venice holders. Queues stay short through Carnival, partly because line 1 is the slowest boat on the Grand Canal and partly because the costumed crowd concentrates east of the Accademia bridge. Costumed visitors do come in to be photographed in the ballroom, so expect a short wait there rather than at the door.

Pro Tip: Be at the door for the 10:00 opening, go straight up for the Longhi rooms and come down to the ballroom afterwards. Note the closing day: Martedì Grasso 2027 falls on Tuesday 9 February, so if Carnival's final day is your only free one, Ca' Rezzonico is shut and Palazzo Mocenigo is the substitute.