Discover Scuola Grande dei Carmini

The building of about 1669 is attributed to Baldassarre Longhena, and it is a confraternity hall rather than a church or a palace -- a building type Venice invented and built six great examples of. The plan is the standard one: meeting rooms on the ground floor, a grand staircase, and the Sala Capitolare above where the brotherhood assembled.

The staircase is the architectural set piece. Antonio Gaspari built it to Longhena's design, a double flight rising under barrel vaults, with white and gilded stuccowork by Alvise Bossi covering the vaults and walls. It is doing the same job as the Scuola di San Rocco's staircase -- turning the climb to the chapter room into a ceremony.

The Sala Capitolare above is a plain rectangular room with a flat wooden ceiling, and it is plain on purpose: the room is a frame for nine painted panels and nothing else competes with them.

Giambattista Tiepolo painted that ceiling between 1739 and 1749, ten years on nine panels, centred on the Madonna del Carmelo appearing to the Blessed Simon Stock and surrounded by allegorical virtues. It is among his major late works and it is still in the room it was made for, which is the thing that makes this building matter.