Two hundred years ago. Piazza San Marco had 27 coffee-houses, with names like the ‘Queen of the Sea’, the ‘Coach of Fortune’, the ‘Matter of Fact’, and, most famously, ‘Venice Triumphant’, now called Florian’s after its founder.
They were open around the clock, lit with ‘a dazzle of everlasting day’–the best places in Venice for a gossip or intrigue, where checks on fidelity were very lightly kept. If expenses be damned, you may agree with an Austrian writer, who reasoned that
since Europe is the most beautiful continent in the world, and Italy the most beautiful country in Europe, and Venice the most beautiful city in Italy, and Piazza San Marco the most beautiful square in Venice, and Florian’s the most beautiful café in the Piazza, I can sit and have my coffee in the most beautiful place in the world.
Image by S.A.C.R.A. srl