Review of Hotel Europa & Regina, by Jamie Dunford Wood

Now part of the all powerful Starwood Group's 'Luxury Hotel Collection,' Hotel Gritti Palace in Venice preserves the character of a family run albergo with traditional Italian style.

The facilities

Downstairs at this luxury hotel, the succession of public rooms are cosy, inviting you to make it your home, with none of the glamourous, yet weary bustle of the Danieli. Low, painted wooden beams vie with oils of past doges on marble, stone and fabric covered walls A magical bar, with walls of antique Venetian mirror glass, gives onto a terrace restaurant overlooking the spectacular Grand Canal.

The rooms

There are 91 rooms and 6 suites at this luxury hotel. Cool cream and gilt corridors with a thin strip of blue carpet on brown marble lead to generally largish rooms, with pretty furnishings, nicely understated traditional Venetian chandeliers and swagged curtains. Little antique details like carriages clocks, antique furniture, and decorative stuccoed walls with marble-effect panels in blues and creams can be found as well.

Others rooms at the Hotel Gritti Palace are in pale yellow, with painted Venetian furniture and elegantly sculpted bedheads. Canal view rooms generally have two large windows and those on the second floor have the highest ceilings. Some of the canal side rooms boast small antique oil paintings.