VICTOR EMMANUEL II GALLERY

It's the most famous shopping mall in the whole city. For the construction, a call for projects was launched: 176 creations were proposed, and Guiseppe Mengoni won. The gallery was built in 1867, six years after the Italian unification carried out precisely by Vittorio Emanuele II of Savoy. Its dome (47 m high) was one of the first glass and iron constructions in Europe. It was not easy to complete, as it cost the life of its architect Giuseppe Mengoni, who fell from a scaffolding. At the intersection of the two transverse aisles the upper part of the facades of the elegant buildings is decorated with allegories of the main cities that were capitals of Italy: Milan, Florence, Rome and Turin. The gallery has always been considered by the Milanese as the salotto di Milano ("Milan's living room") as a traditional meeting and walking place until the 1960s. Today, without having lost any of its charm, it is above all a place of passage between Piazza del Duomo and Piazza della Scala, bordered by a string of cafés and luxury boutiques. In the centre, you will notice the mosaic of the bull: it would be lucky to trample it... Indeed, an old legend says that you have to turn three times on yourself with the heel of your right foot resting on the bull's genitals. Unfortunately, by force, this ritual damages the mosaic which must be regularly restored.