Milan, Italy

After a very long travel day (or was it days? with the time change I'm not sure) involving: crowded planes, a Heathrow Air Traffic Control glitch and delay, multiple train rides, and very little sleep,  we made it to Milan. Whew -- it was an exhausting journey! But with only five days in this beautiful city we don't have time for jet lag so I am just going to have to fight through it.

We are staying in the Brera district which feels very relaxed and laid-back compared to the city center just a 20 minute walk away. There are definitely fewer tourists staying in this part of the city. The Duomo (duomo is Italian for "cathedral") is in the heart of town and its ornate Gothic pink-tinted marble exterior makes it probably one of the most recognized churches in the world. From the terrace of our Airbnb, we can just barely make out some of the cathedral's spires in the distance (where the clouds are in the photo below).

The outside of the church is practically dripping with carvings, statues, gargoyles and pinnacle-style spires. There has been a church on this site since the mid 300s AD, but construction on the existing building began in 1386. For the next 579 years work on the cathedral continued in a hodgepodge of architectural styles, but mostly Gothic. The church wasn't actually considered "finished" until 1965. 

To get a closer look at all the decorations we took the stairs to the rooftop, about 250 steps. From above you can see the intricate details of the buttresses along the sides of the cathedral.

There are over 3000 statues on the façade and rooftop. Statues of saints seem to float in the air on their ethereal pedestals looking out over the city. At the very center of the roof is a golden statue of Mary that watches over the cathedral and protects the city.

This is the third largest cathedral in Europe (after St. Peter's in Rome and the cathedral of Seville in Spain). It can hold 40,000 people. After conquering the north of Italy, Napoleon had himself crowned King of Italy here in 1805.  

Italy has a long and complicated history. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Italy was fragmented into many different kingdoms and duchies that seemed to be constantly at war or under the rule of foreign invaders such as the Spanish Habsburgs, Napoleon's French Empire, and the Austrian Empire. In the 1800s a sense of Italian identity began to take shape and throughout that century various insurrections, uprisings, and wars were fought resulting in the establishment of what we more or less consider modern Italy around 1861. Its first king was Vittorio Emanuele II. This triumphal arch is next to the Duomo and is dedicated to him and to the reunification. 

Going through the arch leads into the Galeria Vittorio Emanuele II which was the first modern shopping mall. Covered glass and wrought-iron roofs let the light in while keeping shoppers dry when it rains. There are four stories of high-end shops and restaurants. Strolling through the galleries feels like stepping back in time to a more elegant era.

The arcade is richly decorated with paintings and a mosaic tiled floor. There are mosiac coats of arms for the four largest cities in Italy: Rome, Florence, Milan and Turin. A tradition holds that if you step on the testicles of the Turin Bull and spin around three times you will have good luck. There was a crowd gathered there and a bit of a wait to do the spin; we didn't perform the ritual but plenty of other people did.

Near the Galleria is the world-renowned opera house La Scala and a beautiful piazza (square) called Piazza della Scala. In the center of the piazza is a huge statue dedicated to Leonardo da Vinci who lived here in Milan for over 20 years. 

His patron was the very powerful Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza. The duke commissioned Leonardo to paint a mural on a refectory wall in the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie church in the 1490s. The refectory was the monk's dining hall, so the subject of the painting was the Last Supper (in Italian it's called Il Cenacolo). It was considered a masterpiece in its day, showcasing da Vinci's understanding of perspective and his ability to capture modern-looking portraits with expressive faces.  

Unfortunately, Leonardo was not a master of the fresco-style of painting. The fresco technique involves painting on a wet plaster surface. The paint bonds with the plaster as it dries and becomes very durable and permanent with vibrant long-lasting colors. However, this technique means the artist has to paint in the moment, and no corrections or retouching will be possible. Leonardo wanted to be able to rework and touch up his mural as he did with his oil paintings, so he chose instead to use an experimental dry painting technique of tempera -- where egg yolks are used as the binding agent after the painting and any corrections have been completed. Unfortunately the painted surface did not hold up well in the humid atmosphere of Milan; it began cracking, flaking, and deteriorating almost immediately after it was finished. Within a couple hundred years it was practically ruined. 

During World War II the church was bombed and although the refectory walls were sandbagged to keep them intact and standing, the roof was destroyed letting even more moisture in. Over the centuries many attempts had been made to restore it and the most recent and successful one was done during the 1980s and 1990s. The restorers were able to clear away grime, mildew and paint layers from previous restorations. They referenced a contemporary copy of the painting that was made by another artist in 1520, just 20 years after da Vinci finished painting. The mural now looks much closer to the original.

You can compare the faded Last Supper with the mural across the room on the opposite wall which was painted around the same time (1495) but using the fresco technique. The colors in The Crucifixion by Giovanni Donato da Montorfano are much brighter and the lines are clearer. You might also notice that it looks like we have the whole room almost to ourselves. This is because nowadays you can only see The Last Supper with an advance booking. About 20-30 people are in each group to view the painting, and you have to go through a series of airlock-type doors. The small groups and special doors cut down on the moisture, and the doors open and close on a schedule so that each group gets 15 minutes inside to view and take photos. It's a good system but definitely requires planning ahead -- you can't just show up at the church and expect to waltz in.

Just a short walk away from Santa Maria delle Grazie is the Basilica di Sant'Ambrogio, dedicated to Saint Ambrose. He was a bishop here in the 4th century AD and is the patron saint of the city. Inside the dome is covered by beautiful Byzantine-style mosaics from the 13th century.

Just to round out our tour of Milan's important churches we stopped in at the Chiesa di San Maurizio al Monastero Maggiore (chiesa means "church" in Italian). This is a more recent church, built in the early 1500s at the height of the Renaissance. 

While many of the murals in San Maurizio date back to the 16th century, there were some more recent 20th century landscapes -- basically every inch of the church interior is either painted or gilded. With all the vibrant frescoes this church deserves its nickname of "Milan's Sistine Chapel".