Sacred grounds - The Convent Garden of Il Redentore, Giudecca, Venice, Italy

The recent exemplary restoration by Paolo Pejrone of the 16th-century monastic gardens is not to be missed,

- Tim Richardson

THE Church of Il Redentore, as it is familiarly known (its official name in English is the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer), sits south of Venice proper, across the water on the narrow island called the Giudecca.

For centuries known primarily as an industrial zone, the island has attracted people to its lower rents and relaxed atmosphere. In 1884, Frederic Eden and his wife, Caroline Jekyll (elder sister of Gertrude), took up residence in an old palazzo a stone’s throw from Il Redentore, just across the Rio della Croce canal, where they made a celebrated garden that was visited by Henry James, Jean Cocteau and many others. (Last occupied by the Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser, who died in 2000, it is now kept in a wild state, according to his wishes.)

To the east of Il Redentore is the Benedictine church of San Giorgio Maggiore, on its own little island, with a brick campanile that is one of the major landmarks to be spied from St Mark’s Square. Both domed churches were designed by Andrea Palladio, although the Franciscan Il Redentore was more simply conceived—its light-filled marble interior a symphony in white, grey, cream and ochre, relatively unadorned by painting, gilding or other decoration. That is not to say it is not magnificent: multiple soaring marble pilasters have a mesmeric effect, each one crowned by a large and richly carved Corinthian capital, creating a sense of an ethereal forest, reflective of St Francis’s fabled engagement with the natural world.