There is a museum open in Milan on Mondays. One. So, now on our own, that’s where we headed this morning. The ADI Italian Design Museum is a timeline of Compasso d’Oro award winners since the prize began in 1954, going all the way up to 2025. In its first few years it was organized by the fancy department store, La Rinascente, but then it was turned over to the Association for Industrial Design (ADI). They formed a foundation in 2001 and eventually opened this museum.
The gold winner is featured in its own display while honorable mentions are in the group for each year. It is an interesting tour of industrial style spanning my life plus about a decade. Here are a couple of items that caught my eye:
Our walk took us through Milan’s Chinatown, which had aromas of ginger in the morning– in other neighborhoods we smell garlic in the morning, but I guess that aromotic comes later in Asian cooking!
On the walk back we commented on the Fiat Topolinos we’d been seeing. The tiniest version can fit perpendicular to the curb when it is parked. A woman heard us chatting about the and enged in a short conversation. She said the cars had only just been released and were everywhere already. Parking is such a problem in Milan, that these cars are useful. She told us that “Topolino” means “Donald Duck,” but it turns out it means, literally, “little mouse,” but is both a term of endearment and the Italian name for Disney’s Mickey Mouse. You can buy them in the USA, and they are legal to drive in golf cart communities (top speed is 19mph). But, there is a conversion kit that makes them legal on streets, raising the speed to 35mph! I was thrilled to find both models conveniently parked with a Mini in between to make the size comparison quite clear.
We’ve had a couple of hotels that refer to their breakfast room as “the breakfast experience.” This doesn’t translate very well. I am not sure why the word experience is needed. The only experiential part of my breakfast might be when they serve honey from the comb and I have to be patient for it to drizzle over my pecorina-romano.
Our dinner tonight, though, does qualify as an experience. Mark arranged for us to dine at Verso- Capitaneo. Two brothers are the chefs, and it is a two star Michelin restaurant. They serve 28 people a night, maximum, and diners sit at counters where they watch the kitchen. In fact, the chefs plate most food right in front of us before we are served. Everone was quiet and focused– nothing like The Bear and we didn’t hear “Yes, Chef,” being yell out even once. We had an amazing tasting menu over our four hour meal. I only took one photo of one dish:
We had beautiful service, naturally. For example, our napkins were changed for the dessert course, and they came out of a warm, wooden box, and were vanilla scented. After we finished, chef let our server show us the new room they are preparing, with views of the Duomo. This room will have traditional service, rather than kitchen view. It was a very memorable evening, to be sure.
Leave a Reply