Where the canals widen and the buzz of tourists fades away, at the north-eastern corner of Cannaregio – the northernmost of the six districts that make up the city of Venice, in Italy – a palazzo has been home to a hotel since 2017. This hotel is not your typical Venetian establishment offering discreet luxury. It is, above all, the expression of the personal obsession of Angela Silarna Valach, a Viennese interior designer at the helm of the MasterPlan A architecture studio. She saw in that palazzo the perfect setting for her dream. We are talking about the Hotel Heureka, which takes its name from that expression in ancient Greek, attributed to Archimedes, meaning ‘Eureka (I have found it)’. As you will see, this is no coincidence.
The story begins with a love affair: “I simply fell in love with this house and its surroundings,” says Valach in the interview published in Venezia News, adding: ‘A palazzo in Cannaregio was the fulfilment of an old dream. But it was in fact too early for us as a family to live here and therefore we decided to create a hotel, but keeping in mind the idea of “it is our home”. In other words, whilst the project evolved from a family home into a hotel, it did so on one condition: that it should feel like a home. In this sense, it can be said that the Hotel Heureka is Angela Valach’s Venetian home, open to guests. “Nomen est omen,” she concludes on this point in the Venezia News interview. By this she means that its name – the aforementioned ‘Eureka’ – became its destiny.
The palazzo was built in the 16th century, during the transition from the Renaissance to the Baroque period. Like many others of the period, the building features a façade typical of Venetian architecture, organised around a central axis with a stone balcony and mullioned windows behind it. Its interior follows the classic layout of the ‘portego’, a kind of central hall that runs the full depth of the building and connects the atrium, the reception area and, at the far end, the private garden. Two ‘piani nobili’, or noble floors, house the main rooms: frescoed salons, a music room with a grand piano and the 10 guest rooms.
According to the architecture and restoration firm Alfier, which was commissioned to renovate the building, due to the state of disrepair in which it was found, the building’s history “could barely be discerned beneath unsuitable cladding that had become discoloured and damaged by excess water seeping through the roof and by flooding”. The restoration work lasted 18 months and involved every part of the building, from the roof right down to the foundations. Alfier thus restored “the typical features of Venetian architecture: the large central halls, the expansive windows, the lime terrazzo floors and the garden with its centuries-old trees”.
The inner garden is undoubtedly one of the true luxuries of the Hotel Heureka. It is an oasis of tranquillity beating at the heart of the Cannaregio building, with mature trees and vegetation that invites relaxation, where breakfast is served or an aperitif can be enjoyed at sunset. Each of the guest rooms is unique. Together, they form a “a coherent and harmonious mosaic of shapes, colours, materials and styles from different times and cultures”, —a blend of Venetian heritage with textiles by Christian Lacroix, Rubelli upholstery, period furniture and paintings by the Austrian artist Julian Khol.
It was a risky venture, says Valach, “it was a great challenge for me and my interior design firm MasterPlan A to make an old, listed building possible for the use as a hotel in a modern world”. The hotel’s location, in a quiet neighbourhood away from the hustle and bustle of St Mark’s Square, is undoubtedly an obvious advantage for a boutique hotel like this. For all these reasons, the Hotel Heureka is not for those seeking action, but for those who want to feel at home in a 16th-century Venetian palazzo. Meanwhile, the calm waters of the Madonna dell’Orto canal lap against its ashlars, piles and arcades. From nearby, you can hear the bells of the Church of the Madonna dell’Orto, and just a few steps away, travellers can lose themselves amongst Tintoretto’s masterpieces.
Sources: Hotel Heureka, Alfier, Venezia News, Il Sole 24 Ore.
Images: Hotel Heureka, Alfier.
