Milan
The arena was Napoleon’s mini-colosseum, which he opened in flamboyant style with a chariot race in 1807. Built by Luigi Canonica, its design allowed it…
Must-see attractions in The Italian Lakes
Chiesa di San Bernardino alle Ossa
Milan
This church dates from the 13th century, when its ossuary was used to bury plague victims from nearby San Barnaba hospital. It was rebuilt in rococo style…
Milan
Annually, nearly 100 million people pass through these hulking portals and onto train platforms beneath a cinematic cylindrical glass roof. Begun in 1912…
Milan
It's difficult not to be bowled over by this oft-ignored hotchpotch of towers, lodges, apses and domes. In spite of appearances, it really is the one…
Museo Civico di Storia Naturale
Milan
This grand neo-Romanesque building houses Milan's natural history museum, complete with dinosaurs, fossils and the largest geology collection in Europe…
Milan
It’s said this former cemetery to the poor was once the burial site for nearly 150,000 people. Now it’s the charming setting for a picnic, read or wander,…
Lake Maggiore
A highlight of Laveno is the Funivia, which whisks passengers up to a panoramic spot 949m above sea level, in the shadow of the Sasso del Ferro peak …
Milan
Napoleon’s temporary Milanese home, the 18th-century Villa Reale, now houses Milan's modern art collection. Made up of bequests from leading Milanese…
Milan
Studio BBPR’s 1958 skyscraper is an iconic Milanese landmark. The top-heavy tower camply tilts at Castello Sforzesco and the Duomo’s lovely buttresses…
Milan
Housed in a fiercely contemporary concrete building created from a defunct grain silo, Giorgio Armani's eponymous museum showcases his love of elegant…
Milan
Construction began in 1956 on Milan’s tallest grattacielo (skyscraper). The 32-storey Pirelli Tower sits on the site of the company’s 19th-century factory…
Milan
Giò Ponti's spindly 1933 steel tower (built in two months flat for a Triennale exhibition) provides a fantastic 108m-high viewing platform over Parco…
Milan
The freestanding row of 16 Corinthian columns from Milan’s Mediolanum heyday were salvaged from a crumbling Roman residence and lined up here to form the…
Lake Maggiore
The chunky medieval Rocca di Angera fortress lords it over the town of Angera in no uncertain terms. From a distance, it is the first thing one sees…
Padiglione d'Arte Contemporanea
Milan
Art and design intertwine at the city’s ground-breaking contemporary galleries. Leading the pack is PAC, which mounts experimental exhibitions in…
Milan
Casa Galimberti, with its ceramic tiles depicting bourgeois beauties, is one of the finest pieces of fin-de-siècle Liberty architecture in Italy.
Milan
The former Cinema Dumont, with its concrete garlands of flowers, is a fine example of fin-de-siècle Liberty architecture.
Milan
One of Milan's fin-de-siècle Liberty treasures, with intricate wrought-iron balconies.
Lake Como
High above the terracotta rooftops of Varenna, the imposing Castello di Vezio offers magnificent views over Lake Como. The 13th-century building was once…
Mantua
Easily usurping Mantua's cathedral, this towering basilica safeguards the golden vessels said to hold earth soaked by the blood of Christ. Longinus, the…
Abbazia di San Pietro al Monte
Lake Como
Birdsong and the rush of a mountain stream accompany you as you make the pilgrimage to the Romanesque Abbazia di San Pietro al Monte (St Peter on the…
Como
Como is flanked to the east and west by steep and thickly wooded hills (scarred in part by the spread of residential housing). Northeast along the…
Lake Garda
The long mountain ridge that towers above the northeast shores of Lake Garda is known as Monte Baldo. Ironically, the name doesn’t refer to its baldness …
Lake Orta
This picturesque region northwest of Lake Orta makes for a splendid day's drive. West out of Omegna, 14km of winding valley road follows a deep river…
Orta San Giulio
Beyond the lush gardens and residences that mark the hill rising behind Orta is a kind of parallel ‘town’ – the sacro monte, where 20 small chapels…
Brescia
Brescia’s impressive archaeological complex cleverly reconstructs the city’s Roman past from fragments first discovered in the 1820s. It consists of three…
Lake Como
Piazza Garibaldi is roughly cobblestoned and it's plain from its time-warped nature that nothing much has changed here down the centuries. Many of the…
Bergamo
One of several towns in Italy with an intact ring of defences, Bergamo’s impressive walls were built by the Venetians over 30 years starting in 1561…
Cremona
Cremona's 111m-tall torrazzo (bell tower, although 'torrazzo' translates literally as ‘great, fat tower’) is the third tallest brick bell tower in the…
Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore
Bergamo
Bergamo's most striking church, begun in 1137, is quite a mishmash of styles. To its whirl of Romanesque apses (on which some external frescoes remain…
Cremona
Set in the spacious halls of the Palazzo Affaitati, Cremona's finest art gallery houses an exquisite collection of paintings dating from the 15th to the…
Lake Como
The Cistercian Abbazia di Piona has a magnificent setting on a promontory stretching out into Lago di Como. There's evidence that a small chapel was built…
Lake Como
Lago di Como's northernmost towns of Dongo, Gravedona and Sorico once formed the independent republic of the Tre Pievi (Three Parishes) and were a hotbed…
Brescia
Perhaps beautiful is not the word but this nonetheless fascinating piazza is a leftover of Il Duce's dreams of grandeur. Designed by Marcello Piacentini…
Como
Hemmed in by houses these days and enclosing one side of what was once a medieval grain market, this Lombard Romanesque basilica dates back to the 7th…
Mantua
The weather-worn, 11th-century, Lombard Romanesque Rotonda di San Lorenzo is sunk below the level of the square, its red-brick walls still decorated with…
Lake Orta
Overlooking the forest-lined banks of the shimmering Lake Orta, this shore-hugging village has abundant allure. It occupies a kidney-shaped peninsula with…
Mantua
Piazza Sordello is the oldest square in Mantua, and was probably the location of the Etruscan town. The existing layout is thanks to the Gonzagas, whose…
Como
About 500m south of Como’s city walls is this austere 11th-century Romanesque church, once the seat of a bishopric built on the orders of St Amantius of…
Brescia
The original Mille Miglia (Thousand Miles) ran between 1927 and 1957 and was one of Italy's most legendary endurance car races – it started in Brescia and…
