Caffé Florian opened in Piazza San Marco in 1720. It is the oldest café in the world (in continuous operation). It is also the most expensive café in the world. The history, the opulence, the music, and the setting make it an unmissable experience if you find yourself in Venice. 

I recently found myself in Venice very unexpectedly and with very short notice. My usual pre-trip research was drastically time impacted by the fact I knew I would be Venice only a week before I arrived. And I was in Umbria, with no time to read. I had not heard of Florian, nor had I planned to be there. However, my culinary background and love of history was appealed to as soon I saw it.

The menu hanging in the window displayed the offerings. Mostly coffee, cocktails, and my beloved aperitivi (spritz with snack, to be had every day at around 5pm). With a small selection of high tea type menu items, some other pastries, traditional breakfast options and the like. The prices were verging on outrageous. €11,50 for a caffe latte, $17 AUD. €62,00 for the afternoon tea with champagne. That is almost $92 AUD, for one person for afternoon tea. We walked past, several times.

The music being played by the quartet, or sometimes quintet, out the front, in the piazza, beckons you to take a seat in the sunshine and enjoy the ambience and the luxury. The music adds an additional charge of €6 per person. However, when in Venice…

I had started doing some research on the café by day two. It was patronised in the early days by people like Goethe, Carlo Goldoni, and Casanova. Later by Lord Byron, Marcel Proust, and Charles Dickens. It was now appealing to my love of writing. 

Our Venetian tour guide at the Palazzo Ducale (Doge’s Palace), Sylvia, explained that it was the only public café that welcomed women in the early days. It was, for this reason, a favourite of Giacomo Casanova. Further to this, when Casanova escaped from Piombi prison, a mere 150 metres away, he stopped at Florian to have an espresso before he fled Venice.

This information was the final nail in the coffin of any rationale to miss this experience due to the price tag. We took at a seat, perused the music menu, ordered an aperitivo each, and drunk in the surroundings hungrily. The €44 ($67 AUD) check did nothing to dampen my joy of sitting in Piazza San Marco, my most desired destination since high school. Drinking the most expensive Aperol and prosecco I have ever imbued. Accompanied by some very good olives, some potato chips and Volare, one of my favourite Italian songs.