Caffè La Serra
The café-bistro housed inside the botanical greenhouse built for the first Art Biennale
The Serra dei Giardini is one of those magical Venetian places suspended in time and space, an ancient 19th-century greenhouse that houses a flower shop and a café and also organizes educational workshops and events.
A magnificent example of industrial archaeology, the greenhouse was built in 1894 as a representative structure of “iron and glass” to house the palms and other decorative plants used for the contemporary International Art Exhibition.
It subsequently experienced mixed fortunes, until in the 1990s it became a storage facility and a hub for municipal gardeners. It was subsequently permanently abandoned until 2006, when the City of Venice began its restoration and, upon completion, handed it over to the Nonsoloverde Cooperative.
The menu includes snacks such as toast, sandwiches, and platters, as well as aperitifs, coffee, and other organic products to be enjoyed in the shade among the trees, in the peace of a stunningly beautiful industrial archaeology structure.
La Serra dei Giardini is magical during the quiet of the week, perfect for reading the newspapers or shopping for flowers: a ray of sunshine is enough to transform a simple coffee into poetry.
The Secret
Originally, the greenhouse was painted white like most of the contemporary European greenhouses of the 19th century, and is the only surviving testimony of the International Art Exhibition, the first Biennale of Art.
Useful Info
Caffè La Serra
Via Giuseppe Garibaldi 1254
30122 Venezia
Tel. +39 041 2960360
Coffees: from €2
Toasts: from €4
Beers: from €3.50
