page_title: Fondaco dei Tedeschi
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Fondaco dei Tedeschi / History
caption_attribution_description: English&#x3a;&#32; Fondaco dei Tedeschi Venice - View of the covered inner courtyard.Français&#x202f;&#x3a;&#32; Fondaco dei Tedeschi à Venise - Vue de la cours intérieure couverte.Italiano&#x202f;&#x3a;&#32; Fondaco dei Tedeschi Venezia - Vista sul cortile coperto.
context_page_description: The Fondaco dei Tedeschi is a historic building in Venice, northern Italy, situated on the Grand Canal near the Rialto Bridge. It was the headquarters and restricted living quarters of the city's German merchants.
context_section_description: First constructed in 1228, the building was rebuilt between 1505  and 1508, after its destruction in a fire. The reconstruction produced a very functional four-floor building which surrounds a grand inner courtyard. 
  Its architecture is typical of the Italian Renaissance style.
  Like the Fondaco dei Turchi, the Fondaco dei Tedeschi combined the functions of a palace, warehouse, market and restricted living quarters for its population, in this case mainly Germanic merchants from cities such as Nuremberg, Judenburg and Augsburg.
  The ground floor was accessible by water and was used for storage, while the first floor was dedicated to offices and an upper area contained about 160 living quarters. 
  The German merchants arrived shortly after the building was originally constructed in the 13th century and stayed until the Napoleonic occupation. It was one of the city's most powerful colonies of merchants, and consequently the fondaco became an important trading centre for goods passing from the Orient on their way towards the Alps.  The Venetian Republic took commission on the transactions of the fondaco.
  The German community worshipped at a nearby Catholic church, San Bartolomeo.
  In the 20th century the building served as the Venice headquarters of the Poste Italiane. In 2008, the building was sold to the Benetton Group who asked the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas to plan a new shopping centre to be incorporated into the Renaissance building. Benetton promised to transfer 6 million Euro to the city budget in exchange for building permits handed over by the end of 2012. This caused protests among the groups campaigning for preservation of the Italy's historical heritage.
caption: New organization of the Courtyard.
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "Fondaco dei Tedeschi - Courtyard", "Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D800E", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CC (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2017:07:31 10:15:41", "Image Artist": "Didier Descouens", "Image ExifOffset": "2402", "Image XPTitle": "[70, 0, 111, 0, 110, 0, 100, 0, 97, 0, 99, 0, 111, 0, 32, 0, 100, 0, 101, 0, ... ]", "Image XPAuthor": "Didier Descouens", "Image XPKeywords": "[86, 0, 101, 0, 110, 0, 105, 0, 99, 0, 101, 0, 0, 0]", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "5382", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "10870", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/50", "EXIF FNumber": "9/2", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "1100", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2016:11:01 10:09:11", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2016:11:01 10:09:11", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "352741/62500", "EXIF ApertureValue": "86797/20000", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "4", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "24", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "801", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "801", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "7270", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "6525", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "16780511/8192", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "16780511/8192", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "3", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[2, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Manual", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "24", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "High gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF BodySerialNumber": "6011792", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[24, 120, 4, 4]", "EXIF LensModel": "24.0-120.0 mm f/4.0", "EXIF Padding": "[]"}