Clubs
Fashionable at all levels of Venetian Society, clubs were taken very seriously and if rival factions happened to meet it could be all out warfare regardless of the fact that many clubs were for women only. Not much more than rival street gangs in some cases, clubs were formed for many reasons be it to protect a local parish, race boats in the regttas or for young hellrakes from the nobility to indulge themselves in lascivious wassail.
Members of clubs would proudly display their membership wearing badges on their clothing and insignia in their caps. The richer the membership of the clubs the more ornate and expensive the paraphenalia associated with them. Emblems encrusted with Jewels and Pearls were not unknown amongst the rich.

Scuole
In any look at Venetian Society a brief mention must be given to that most peculiarly Venetian institutions, the Scuole. Founded mainly in the 13th Century, they were lay confraternities instituted for :

The charitable benefit of the neediest groups of society

The benefit of the professions - in another city these would have been called Guilds.

The benefit of the resident ethnic minorities.

Some became extremely rich and spent large sums of money on buildings and paintings often to the disadvantage of their declared beneficiaries. One of the largest scuole, the Scoule Grande di San Marco supported the city's general hospital, the Ospedale Civile. The scuole's building built onto the hospital has to be the most lavish and gaudiest fronting ever found on a hospital. The money spent maintaining the lavish interior and the vast and far ranging library inside is only possible because membership of the scuole is a sign of having reached the pinnacle of Venetian Society. As with the Scuole Grande di San Marco, other scuole became patrons of architects and artists working in and around Venice and the Republic. Magi visiting from other European collegia would be shocked at the lavish interiors of the Scuole di Mercere, which to the Venetian magi is a legitimate expense in order to maintain their status in the city's society. The scuole were in effect a blend of charity, social club and guild all rolled into one.

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