I LOVE MILANO DURING FASHION WEEK BECAUSE:

I like to see all my friends, see the shows and take lots of photographs and party pictures, basically - I Y MY WORK !!! Here is a small section of the 360 degree view from Katherine Mondadori's apartment high up into the grey Milanese sky. On the left, the 26 floor Torre Velasca built in 1957 by the Studio BBPR (Ludovico Belgioioso, Enrico Peressutti and Ernesto Nathan Rogers) it is one of the tallest, significant and unusual buildings of post-war and post-fascist architecture. On the right the highly recognizable and famous Duomo. In 1386 the archbishop of Milan, Antonio da Saluzzo, began the new project, in a rayonnant Late Gothic style and work has proceeded for generations and it still is unfinished. There is a famous Milanese saying that when something takes forever "... it takes as long as the Duomo factory"! It is best described in Mark Twain's book Innocents Abroad* "What a wonder it is! So grand, so solemn, so vast! And yet so delicate, so airy, so graceful! A very world of solid weight, and yet it seems......a delusion of frostwork that might vanish with a breath!..." The Duomo is the emblem of Milan and Milan is the home to Italian fashion and design...... so.........let's go see the fashion shows.

*available from www.amazon.com