Founder Simeone Codognato’s fascination with the macabre was evident in his skull rings. Photo courtesy Codognato

One of Codognato's now-legendary skull rings. Photo courtesy Codognato

Codognato's skull rings, with twinkling diamond eyes, are designed to remind the wearer not to waste a precious day of life. Photo courtesy Codognato

The skull makes its way onto other pieces of Codognato jewellery too, including earrings. Photo courtesy Codognato

A uniquely macabre Codognato ring featuring a bejewelled coffin. Photo courtesy Codognato

The coffin swivels open to reveal a skeleton. Photo courtesy Codognato

Another iconic Codognato design: the snake ring, covered head to tail in diamonds. Photo courtesy Codognato

A bejewelled Codognato snake ring in yellow gold. Photo courtesy Codognato

There have been many variations of the snake ring throughout Codognato's illustrious history. Photo courtesy Codognato

An extravagant ring, set with diamonds and coloured stones, by Codognato. Photo courtesy Codognato

A Codognato brooch. Photo courtesy Codognato

A Codognato Blackamoor brooch, hand-carved from precious metals and ebony, and set with diamonds. Photo courtesy Codognato

The interior of the Codognato shop contains original Venetian arching lamps and Simeone Codognato's ornate gold carved desk. Photo courtesy Codognato

Simeone Codognato's grandson, Attilio Codognato, continues to work from the same wood-fronted shop behind Piazza San Marco in Venice, reissuing designs from the archives and buying old Codognato pieces at auction and through private sales. Photo courtesy Codognato

The Codognato jeweler’s has been a landmark of Venice for over a century.It remains a distinguished island in a city whose heart has tended to erode.

It was back in 1866 that Simeone Codognato decided to open his shop in the very same spot where it stands today. More than a business venture, it was an act of faith. Simeone’s son immediately understood the considerable interest of the jewels unearthed by contemporary archaeological digs in Etruria which inspired him to a revolutionary new jeweler’s art. Attilio Codognato, the current owner, from closely following creative evolutions, and welcomes to his display windows everything which strikes his imagination. For this highly cultured man, a great specialistin contemporary painting, and capable of constructive eclecticism, is also a man of a impeccable taste.‘I created, beyond the countryside traversed by bands of rare music, the phantoms of future nocturnal luxury.’ Those were the words of surrealist poet Arthur Rimbaud, but they might as well have been coined by the mythical House of Codognato to describe its own rare alchemy, a jeweller’s dark passion that feeds on the dead and dusty city of Venice.

With its ‘vanitas’ themes and elaborately detailed confections – including baroque blackamoor brooches, antique cameos, gem-encrusted skulls and glittering serpentine rings – wearing Codognato is like an ode to tongue-in-cheek gothic horror, a toothless smile at those who take its dark metaphor too seriously.

For some – often style cognoscenti that have stumbled on this secret address by accident – they are eloquent time capsules that portray much more than they suggest. Italian director Luchino Visconti, who himself immortalized the city’s macabre beauty in his Thomas Mann adaptation ‘Death in Venice’, would stand outside the boutique, enthralled by the subliminal stare of Codognato’s Blackamoor moretto – its master/slave pearl tableau a ghost from the paintings of Vittore Carpaccio. He also gazed at that symphony of monarchic skulls dancing on a flash of silver snake, much coveted by past style-mavens such as Coco Chanel and Diana Vreeland.

Skulls – chained to ivory caskets, draped in gold leaf, buckled to diamond dice, eye-sockets spliced with angry snakes – are all the fashion nowadays, and Codognato has played a big part in elevating the symbol to iconic status. In the words of one Attilio Codognato, the famously charming scion-in-residence: ‘They make me think of what I will be one day and so I try to be nice to people and live my life with that in mind’. Isn’t death a blast!

Codognato. 1295 San Marco 30124 Venice - +39 041 522 5042