Chiesa di Santo Stefano

Venice has four leaning bell towers, and Santo Stefano's is the most dramatic — tilting over two metres off-centre, visible from the campo below at an angle that makes tourists instinctively step back. The church itself has been consecrated six times because it kept being desecrated by murders committed inside it. Venetians were passionate people, and apparently the sanctity of a church was not enough to prevent the occasional stabbing.

Built in the 14th century by the Augustinian order, Santo Stefano has one of the finest Gothic interiors in Venice. The ceiling is a stunning ship's-keel vault — carved wooden beams arching overhead like the inverted hull of a galley, built by the same shipwrights who constructed Venice's navy at the Arsenale. It's a reminder that in Venice, even church construction was influenced by the sea.

The campo outside is one of the best people-watching spots in Venice. Large, sunny, and lined with cafés, it hosts a daily market and serves as the social centre of the San Marco district for actual Venetians, not tourists. The statue in the middle honours Niccolò Tommaseo, a 19th-century writer and patriot who helped lead Venice's 1848 revolt against Austrian rule — a man with magnificent sideburns and the unfortunate distinction of having a statue that, from behind, appears to be defecating books.

The church houses works by Tintoretto and contains the tomb of the Doge Francesco Morosini, who in 1687 achieved the dubious distinction of accidentally blowing up the Parthenon in Athens when his artillery hit the Ottoman gunpowder magazine stored inside it.