In this episode of Venice Talks, Monica meets Shanti Ganesha, founder of Meracu, a contemporary leather workshop in Venice.

We talk about the first moment leather felt like a language, the leap that led to opening a workshop in 2022, and how living between Venice and India shapes a design identity that feels built into every piece, not added on.

From material to method, we explore how a hide is chosen, what certified vegetable tanned leather changes over time, and why some steps cannot be rushed. We also get into the unseen side of independent craft: refusing serial production, learning to say no, and answering the question every artisan hears sooner or later, “Can you make it exactly the same?”

A conversation about hands, time, and integrity, with Venice as a living backdrop where making still means something.

1. Shanti Ganesha, founder of Meracu, on building a leather workshop in Venice (2022)
2. Between Venice and India: how heritage becomes structure, not decoration
3. Choosing a hide, reading grain and scars, and working with certified vegetable tanned leather
4. The slow step you cannot rush and the signature gesture that reveals the maker
5. Refusing serial production, learning to say no, and answering “Can you make it identical?”
6. Looking ahead: collaborations, apprentices, and a five year vision for the workshop

🎧 Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you tune in.

✨ Credits:

Hosted by Monica Cesarato

Produced by Monica Cesarato, Sentire Media

Guest: Shanti Ganesha from Meracu

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In this episode of Venice Talks, Monica sits down with Bryan Brazeau, Academic Director of the Warwick Venice Centre, to talk about what happens when a university and a city begin to think together.

We explore Venice not as a setting, but as a working intellectual environment, and Warwick not simply as an institution abroad, but as a way of approaching knowledge through place, daily life, and lived experience.

Episode key notes:

1. What Warwick and Venice genuinely have in common beneath the surface
2. Why Venice works as a living classroom rather than a historical backdrop
3. How place shapes academic thinking, research, and teaching
4. The experience of studying and teaching with the city, not around it
5. The dual identity of the Warwick Venice Centre, both local and international
6. What students carry with them after living and learning in Venice
7. A shared love for Venetian cuisine, and how food becomes another way of understanding the city
8. Why eating, cooking, and sharing meals are part of truly living Venice
9. The value of intellectual distance, and why studying elsewhere matters
10. Looking ahead: the future of the Warwick Venice Centre and place-based education

A conversation about learning, location, and culture, where ideas, flavours, and stories move slowly and stay longer.

🎧 Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you tune in.

✨ Credits:

Hosted by Monica Cesarato

Produced by Monica Cesarato, Sentire Media

Guest: Prof. Bryan Brazeau from Warwick Venice Centre

If you love hearing the voices of Venice, subscribe and leave a review — it helps others discover these stories too.

💌 Want to share your own Venice?

Send me a short audio clip (1 minutes max) telling me what you loved most about the city — at info@monicacesarato.com.

In this episode of Venice Talks, Monica speaks with Sergio Vidal of Atelier Martina Vidal Venezia, a family atelier that has safeguarded the art of Burano lace for four generations.

They talk about patience as a creative act, about heritage that does not live in museums but in the hands of artisans, and about the quiet strength required to carry an ancient craft into the present without losing its soul.

This conversation moves through memory, responsibility, beauty, and the fragile power of thread that, stitch after stitch, still tells the story of Venice.

Listen slowly. Venice is speaking softly.

1. The Vidal family history and the roots of their lace tradition in Burano
2. What it truly means to preserve a craft that cannot be rushed
3. The balance between tradition and innovation inside the atelier
4. The role of artisans in keeping Venice culturally alive
5. Why Burano lace is far more than decoration or souvenir
6. The human and emotional side of working with a centuries old technique
7. The future of lace and why younger generations should care

If you love Venice, craftsmanship, and the stories behind the hands that make beauty possible, this episode is for you.

🎧 Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you tune in.

✨ Credits:

Hosted by Monica Cesarato

Produced by Monica Cesarato, Sentire Media

Guest: Sergio Vidal from Atelier Martina Vidal

If you love hearing the voices of Venice, subscribe and leave a review — it helps others discover these stories too.

💌 Want to share your own Venice?

Send me a short audio clip (1 minutes max) telling me what you loved most about the city — at info@monicacesarato.com.