Hi, I’m Laura. Today I want to tell you about my grandfather who, when I was little, spoke to me about a different Venice. I remember as if it were now that one day he told me, "You know, once there was more land in Venice. And yes, even horses." He didn't say it because he had actually seen it that way, but because here certain images pass from voice to voice; they belong to the collective memory. However, for years I thought it was one of those somewhat romanticized stories. Then, studying and living in the city with more attention, I realized that within those words, there was something very concrete.

When Venice was not just water

In the first centuries of its history, between the Early Middle Ages and the thirteenth century, Venice had not yet taken the compact and completely aquatic form we know today. The canals existed, of course, but they were not so defined, and in many places, the city left space for wider, less fragmented surfaces. Bridges were few, often made of wood, and did not yet connect everything as they do now. In this still unstable balance between land and water, some areas allowed the passage of animals and small carts. It was not a city built for wheels, but neither was it a city that excluded them entirely. It was a Venice in transformation, still open to different possibilities. Then, slowly, something changes. Between the 13th and 16th centuries, at the height of the Republic's growth, the city takes a precise direction. It is not a sudden decision, but a series of interventions that, put together, completely transform the way of living in Venice. The canals are maintained, expanded, and made increasingly central. The city needs water to move, to trade, to stay alive within the lagoon. Bridges increase in number, but they remain structures designed for those moving on foot, with steps that already then made the passage of carts impossible. The urban space adapts little by little to this logic, until definitively excluding everything that needs wheels. It is not a loss. It is a choice, consistent with what Venice was becoming.

The gondola and daily life

In this new balance, the gondola finds its natural space. Between the fifteenth and eighteenth centuries, it becomes a constant presence, an integral part of daily life. It has nothing symbolic about it; it does not yet represent anything other than a necessity. It serves for getting around, for crossing the city, for connecting places that by then exist primarily along the water. Over time it is perfected, changes shape, and adapts. But it remains, first and foremost, an essential tool. It is the most direct, most logical, and most coherent way to experience a city that has decided to be water.

What we see today

Today, walking through the calli and crossing the bridges, that transformation is still visible. The steps interrupt any possible continuity for wheels, the spaces narrow, and the paths bend to the structure of the city. Everything seems to suggest that Venice was never designed for anything else. Yet, knowing that once it was not exactly like this changes one's perspective. When I think back to my grandfather, to that sentence said almost lightly, I realize that inside there was a truth: Venice was not born immobile. It became what it is today through a slow transformation, made of adaptations, necessities, and choices. A city that, at a certain point, stopped listening to the noise of wheels and decided to follow only that of the water.



Want to see this story with your own eyes?

If this transformation intrigues you, there is a very original way to explore it further. You can visit the Gondola Gallery in Campo San Gallo, where the history of the gondola is told through the centuries via an immersive 3D VR experience that allows you to truly "enter" the Venice of the past. And after seeing how everything has changed, the best way to close the circle remains only one: get on a gondola and cross the city from the water, just as has been done here for centuries.