There are places you always return to. Maybe because we were happy in them. Or perhaps because in its streets we never feel like strangers. Milan is one of these cities of memory that, like old friends, we can go years without seeing them, but when we meet again it seems that time stopped so as not to forget them.
The capital of Lombardy is a metropolis of coffee and cafes, where its ristrettos taste little, but its cafes captivate a lot. They can be tasted at the Giacomo Café of the Palazzo Reale, accompanied by their own produced brioches; in the Pasticceria Cova, which a Napoleon soldier opened two hundred years ago next to the La Scala theater and where aristocrats and revolutionaries have passed by; in the Magenta Bar, with its period setting, just a stone’s throw from the Santa Maria delle Grazie convent, where Leonardo’s The Last Supper appears; or in the Luce, designed by the filmmaker Wes Anderson for the Prada Foundation, which recreates the atmosphere of the Milanese cafes of the sixties, with brightly colored Formica furniture, where there is no shortage of jukebox and pinball.
But Milan is above all the capital of design. Fashion, furniture, interiors. It has been in this city where design prevailed in the last century until it became a strong identity. Ettore Sotssas and company created the Memphis group in the eighties to reinvent our homes, flooding them with colors and changing their shapes. The designs became designs to exile boredom from our homes. And all the objects in our lives began to change.
It is worth visiting the city during Design Week but, if not, we will always have Via Turini, in the historic center: 300 meters of street of pure Italian design, where furniture stores are located next to each other. And to remember when it all began, it is worth visiting the Milan Trienale, whose collection brings together 1,600 objects from 1927 to the present, which is a trip through the time tunnel.
For any fashion victim, Il Quadrilatero is the branch of paradise on Earth. There are four streets (Corso Venezia, Via delle Spiga, Via Montenapoleone and Via Manzini), which make up the itinerary of the big fashion brands, many of which have their headquarters in this city. This is the case of Prada, Versace, Moschino, Dolce
Some of these brands have dared to enter the field of restaurants or hospitality: Armani or Bulgari have five-star hotels with their name, which are a spectacle for their elegance and clientele. Cavalli has a cocktail bar, Prada has recovered the Pasticceria Marchessi, from the 19th century, which makes the best panettone on the planet (400 euros for two kilos) and Dolce
A walk through the Milan of design cannot forget a trip to 10 Corso Como, an establishment that was founded by Carla Sozzani, sister of Franca, who was director of Vogue Italia. In its day it was conceived as a multi-space where culture, music, gastronomy and, naturally, fashion have a place. And where big brands compete for space with emerging brands, in an environment where all modernities go hand in hand.
The Lombard capital never disappoints. As designer Bruno Munari said, in Milan design is part of the game of living. A game in constant transformation that only makes us fear for our credit card.
