Ca' d'Oro

Ca' d'Oro is Venice's most celebrated Gothic palace on the Grand Canal, a 15th-century palazzo housing the Franchetti Gallery with masterworks by Mantegna and Bellini. Built between 1428 and 1430 for the patrician Marino Contarini, the palace features the kind of delicate tracery, pointed arches, and open loggias that define the Venetian Gothic style at its peak. The original exterior was lavishly decorated with gold leaf, ultramarine blue, and vermilion, though the colors have long since weathered away, leaving the pale Istrian stone and red Verona marble that visitors see today. The building passed through numerous owners over the centuries and suffered some unfortunate renovations before Baron Giorgio Franchetti purchased it in 1894. Franchetti spent decades restoring the palace to something approaching its original splendor, then donated both the building and his private art collection to the Italian state in 1916. The Galleria Giorgio Franchetti now occupies two floors and features a notable collection spanning medieval to Renaissance art. The star piece is Andrea Mantegna's St. Sebastian, displayed in a chapel-like setting Franchetti designed specifically for it. Giovanni Bellini's recently restored Pieta is another highlight. The collection also includes bronzes, ceramics, Flemish paintings, and fragments of frescoes by Giorgione and Titian salvaged from the exterior of the Fondaco dei Tedeschi. The inner courtyard, with its original mosaic floor and wellhead, offers a sense of how Venetian palace life was organized around these private open-air spaces.