Palazzo Labia

This palazzo (1750) on Campo San Geremia is unusual for facing the Canale di Cannaregio with a secondary façade set back from the Grand Canal. It has always had something about it that sent its residents over the top (perhaps because it was designed in part by Alessandro Tremignon, the architect of San Moisè).

The palace was built for a fabulously wealthy and slightly bonkers Catalan family who paid their way into the Golden Book after the wars with the Turks and then paid Giambattista Tiepolo to spectacularly fresco their ballroom with The Life of Cleopatra (1745–50), obviously a family role model in extravagance. Along with Gerolamo Mengozzi-Colonna’s fine trompe l’œil architectural frescoes, they are a sheer delight, sensuous and lavish in their illusionist perspectives.