Palazzo Vendramin-Calergi

Lonely Planet review

Behind the restrained Renaissance canalside of this mansion lurk the gambling rooms of the city's casino. The composer Richard Wagner expired here in 1883. You can wander into the ground-floor area during casino hours but you'll have to fork out to see the gaming rooms, where formal dress is obligatory. To tour the rooms Wagner took while in Venice, book a place on Friday between 10:00 and noon for the tour that takes place at 10:30 on Saturday.

Wagner and his family came to Venice (for the sixth time) to winter in 1882-83. As many travelling notables from northern climes did, he rented rooms in one of the palazzi on the Grand Canal. Today, three of the main rooms that he occupied, long used as offices, can be seen. The first room is dominated by a Bechstein piano not unlike what Wagner would have played on in what he set up as his study. Various bits of Wagneriana are on display, including early editions of his Parsifal . The second room he used as a mixed study and rest room. A copy of the sofa on which he had his fatal heart attack lies in one corner. He wrote the second act of his opera, Tristan and Isolde in Venice.

In the third room (his bedroom) you can see letters and other documents, including a request from his wife to the Hotel de l'Europe to deliver 12 demi-bouteilles (half-bottles) of Moet & Chandon to their gondolier.