Ai Do Draghi

At a glance

Type

Bacaro

Where

Dorsoduro 3665, Campo Santa Margherita

Setting

The largest open square of Dorsoduro, ringed with tables

Founding year

Not documented in any source we could check

Overview

Campo Santa Margherita is where the students of Ca’ Foscari and the residents of Dorsoduro meet in the evening, and the campo is the room: people take a glass and stand outside. Ai Do Draghi is one of the counters that serve it.

We can say what it is and where it is. We cannot say how old it is: neither the establishment nor any institutional source publishes a founding year, and it is not in the regional register of historic places of commerce. Rather than fill the gap with a plausible date, we leave it open.

History

The name means «at the two dragons». Venetian shop signs of this kind often descend from a real carved or painted sign, and Giuseppe Tassini’s survey of Venetian street names records many of them — but no source we could find documents one here, and we are not going to invent a lineage for it.

What the square around it carries is well documented: Santa Margherita was a parish campo of the popular quarter, kept its market, and never became a monumental space. That is why it still works as one.

What you see

A small counter and a few tables, with the crowd of the campo outside. In the evening the square fills, and the drinking is done standing, which is the form this city has always preferred.

Practical information

• Address: Dorsoduro 3665, Campo Santa Margherita, 30123 Venezia
• Telephone: +39 041 639 9946
• Note: the campo is a fifteen-minute walk from the Accademia and from Piazzale Roma, and is not on the Grand Canal

Nearby

• Auditorium Santa Margherita — 13 m away
• Campo San Pantalon — 61 m away
• Il Caffè Rosso — Bar, 73 m away

Sources

• The establishment’s own site, for the address
• OpenStreetMap, for the location in Dorsoduro at Campo Santa Margherita
• Regione Veneto, register of historic places of commerce — the business does not appear