Milan City Guide

Milan, the capital of the Lombardy region of Italy, is renowned the world over as a fashion capital of the world. This city, which hosts bi-annual fashion weeks, usually receives a huge influx of fashion trade folk who head to its shores to conduct business as well as to observe new trends.

However, aside from being the epicenter of style, Milan is also known to offer various other attractions like world-class shopping, historic landmarks and museums and many other cultural delights that attract tourists of all ages to book a vacation to Milan ever so often.

Most visitors on a vacation or business trip to Milan like to be based within the city’s golden triangle area, which radiates from its central Piazza Duomo. Located here is the world’s first glass enclosed shopping center, the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II which is a major draw in Milan. The Golden Triangle affords easy access to other attractions like the Piazza della Scala, which hosts Milan’s famous opera house and Via Montenapoleone that is the city’s high fashion district and the center of design. The Golden Triangle is the most popular accommodation option in Milan and accordingly hosts myriad hotels that range from luxury hotels to discount hotels and budget accommodation options.

The central Milanese neighborhoods of Magenta and Brera are other popular choices for accommodation in Milan. The Magenta neighborhood of Milan is an old residential area that is home to several churches including the famous Santa Maria delle Grazie, which houses Leonardo da Vinci’s famed artwork, the Last Supper. The Brera neighborhood is known for its vibrant nightlife and hosts several bars and many inexpensive restaurants. Both these neighborhoods offer a variety of hotels of all grades, which are popular with visitors on a vacation or business trip to Milan.

The Duomo, which is situated on Milan’s Piazza Duomo, is perhaps its most well-known attraction in Milan. The construction of this cathedral, which is the world’s largest Gothic cathedral, continued in fits and starts until it was completed by a Napoleonic order in 1386. The Duomo can house 40,000 worshippers and is adorned with 3400 statues, 135 spires and gorgeous stained glass windows. It also contains the graves of many famous Italians.

Every year during the months of May and September, the Duomo hosts an exhibit of a nail from the cross of Christ, which attracts many worshippers from around the globe. The Museo del Duomo is located opposite the cathedral in the Palazzo Reale and has exhibits of art treasures from the Duomo; though it also hosts the Museo d'Arte Contomporanea, which has exhibits of modern day Italian art.

Milan’s world famous opera house, Teatro alla Scalla is located on the site of the Church of Santa Maria alla Scala. The opera house also has its own museum filled with displays of souvenirs associated with the country’s most famous composers like Verdi, Rossini, Puccini and Toscanini.

The Milan Aquarium is the oldest and largest of its kind in Italy. The Milan Aquarium is an important center for Marine Biology and Oceanic studies in Italy and is equipped with 36 huge pools filled with more than 100 species of fish sourced from all corners of the world. If you are on vacation in Milan with your children, then the Milan Aquarium should be included as a must-do on your list of attractions.

The Orto Botanico di Brera is home to Milan’s famed Botanical gardens. These gardens were founded in 1774 by Maria Theresa of Austria who wished to establish a garden which could be used by students. Today these gardens host green houses from the 19th century and flowerbeds and ponds from the 18th century. They are a must-see for any gardening enthusiast or plant lover who is on a visit to Milan.

The huge Sforzesco Castle was built in the 15th century and is one of Milan’s most well known monuments. This edifice, which suffered much damage during WWII, was restored in 1943 and contains three museums including the Museum of Historic Art, which hosts many sculptures including the Pieta Rondanini, which is Michelangelo’s famed masterpiece and his last work. The two other museums located within this castle are the Museum of Applied Arts and the Archaeological Museum.

This museum offers displays of many of Leonardo’s avant-garde designs, which were truly revolutionary at the time that they were created. These designs include war machines to architectural designs and exhibits of applied physics. This museum is yet another fascinating attraction in Milan that is definitely worth a visit on any vacation in the city.

This Renaissance church is located in the Magenta district of Milan and renowned the world over for being the home of Leonardo da Vinci’s most famous and largest work , ‘The Last Supper’. Leonardo da Vinci lived in the convent at the church between 1495 and 1497 during which he created this famed masterpiece.

Milan, unlike the rest of Italy has a climate, which can best be described as temperate as it is characterized by hot, humid summers and cold, damp winters. Summers in Milan are usually hot and sultry and experience temperatures that soar above 30 °C (86 °F) especially during the month of July. Winters in Milan are typically damp and cold with average temperatures ranging from -3 to 4 °C (39 °F). The city also receives much snowfall during the winter months.

Most tourists tend to head to Milan during the summer holiday months but the ideal time to sight-see in Milan is during the spring and autumn months when the weather is cool and crisp and walking around the city is especially pleasurable.

If you are in the midst of planning a vacation to Milan, it would be worth your while to explore the various flight deals for Milan that we at Fare Buzz have to offer. Fare Buzz offers cheap air flights all throughout the year and no matter when you decide to book your Milan vacation, Fare Buzz may have attractive cheap air tickets waiting for you.

Milan can be accessed via its Milan Malpensa airport, which is Milan’s largest airport. This airport is located at a distance of 24 miles (39 km) from the city center. The city is also served by other airports like the Milan Linate airport located (4 1/4 miles) east of the center and handles some European flights and many domestic flights. Then there is Milan Bergamo airport, which is located 45 km from Milan, near the city of Bergamo. The Milan Bergamo airport mainly receives low cost carriers from all over Europe.

Malpensa airport is connected by rail, bus and taxis to the center of Milan. The Malpensa Express train connects the airport to Cadorna Stazione Nord in Milan, a station that also offers convenient links to the Milanese subway and suburban rail network.

Milan, in fact, has a well developed and extensive public transport system that is made up of the metro, bus, trams and trolleys, which are all inter connected and easily navigable by tourists. Like every other city, Milan’s transport needs are also catered by taxis, which are plentiful but need to be hired at market stands.

Most tourists on a trip to Milan elect to use the city’s many modes of public transport rather than rent a car in the city for traffic conditions. Parking charges in Milan can be nightmarish. However if you are on vacation in Milan and want to rent a car to visit tourist attractions like Lake Cuomo, which are located on the outskirts of Milan then Fare Buzz can be of assistance. Fare Buzz offers a variety of affordable car rentals for Milan, which can be booked via our booking engine, much like how you would book air tickets.

When you are on vacation in Milan you can’t help but get seduced by this fashion capital's style and verve and one of the best places to soak in this great atmosphere is in one of the oldest shopping malls of the world, Milan’s glass covered bell époque building called Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. This mall, which starts at Piazza Duomo and ends at Piazza della Scala, connects two of Milan's best known landmarks:- the Duomo and the Teatro Alla Scala. The Galleria is a vibrant space populated with many bars, restaurants and cafes as well as many designer label shops like Gucci, Prada. Louis Vuitton etc. The Prada store that resides in this gallery opened its doors for business nearly a century ago in 1913. The Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II should be considered must-do for any shopping enthusiast on a visit to Milan.

Yet another popular shopping haunt in Milan is the city’s Corso Buenos Aires Street, which is located in the north-east part of the city. This area hosts 350 diverse shops and outlets, including the highest concentration of clothing stores in Europe.

Among all the designer stores and boutiques that line the streets of the fashion capital of the world, a store that should be considered a must-visit for any lover of design and style is 10 Corso Como.

Spread over 13000 square feet, this store, which was founded by native Milanese fashion guru Carla Sozzani in 1991, includes a bookstore that has design and art books sourced from all over the world, an eclectic boutique that stocks apparel and accessories for men and women, a boutique that retails delightful lifestyle goods and luxe designer goods, which are imported from different parts of the globe. Corso Como is set up like an exotic flea market or bazaar though its prices are definitely not of the flea market variety.

Milan is known to be one of the leading gastronomic capitals of the world. The city, which is renowned for its native foods and beverages like the bitter alcoholic drink Campari and the universally loved Gelato, offers a wide variety of restaurants and pasticcerias that cater to all kind of travel budgets. Some of the most well known and highly regarded restaurants in Milan include eateries like Trattoria Montina, Ristorrante Cracco, Risacca 6, La Latteria, Nobu, and Don Juan.

As an epicenter of fashion and style, Milan offers an invigorating nightlife scene that features bars, cocktail lounges, jazz clubs, dance clubs and more. Most of Milan’s nightlife haunts are concentrated in its Brera and Navigili neighborhoods so if the object of your Milanese vacation is to explore Milan’s nightlife haunts then perhaps you should set up base at one of the many hotels located within one of its nightlife rich neighborhoods.