An Apartment in Venice

Santa Maria Formosa

ABOVE: The holiday apartment (right) is on a quiet side street near the Campo Santa Maria Formosa. INSET BELOW: Doorbell and brass plate.

by Durant Imboden

If you're staying in Venice for a few days or longer, consider renting a furnished apartment or holiday flat. There are three good reasons why you may prefer an apartment over a hotel:

• The apartment is likely to be a better value, since a multi-room holiday flat is often no more expensive than a double room in a three-star hotel.

• You'll have more space, with a kitchen and possibly a washing machine for clothes.

• You'll feel like a resident of Venice instead of a tourist.

In 2004, my son and I rented the Santa Maria Formosa Apartment in the Castello district, a few blocks from the Campo Santa Maria Formosa and about a 10-minute walk from the Piazza San Marco. The furnished apartment had a large living room with a dining table, a bedroom, a kitchen with a washing machine, and a bathroom that opened onto a private courtyard with a clothesline. The shoulder-season price was only €125 per night, taxes and cleaning included.

The location was perfect: We could buy our morning breakfast supplies at a bakery just around the corner, and the Campo Santa Maria Formosa was a pleasant place for lounging or calling home with our cellular phone. (The apartment itself was in a "dead zone," so we'd walk to the campo and make our calls while watching women buying flowers, old people chatting in the square, and kids bouncing soccer balls off the wall of the church.) Our apartment was at the end of a narrow alley off the cross street that led to the campo, so it was extremely quiet even at the busiest times of the day.

The Santa Maria Formosa Apartment wasn't fancy, but it was atmospheric, comfortable, and impeccably clean. It was the perfect size for two people and would have been ideal for a couple with one or two children. Four adults could share the apartment if one couple didn't mind sleeping on the living room's sofa bed. (One caveat: Although the apartment is heated, it doesn't have air conditioning. Still, because it isn't in the direct sun, it shouldn't get too hot on a typical summer day.)

For information on how to reserve the Santa Maria Formosa Apartment through Venere, our Italian booking partner, see the booking information page. You can also click here or use the navigation table below to take a photo tour.

Next page: Booking information

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