So, I’m Going to the Olympics
Here’s what I’m doing in Milan...
In about a week, I’m going to the Olympics. I’ve decided to stay in the city of Milan and focus on the important stuff. That is, the figure skating.
I thought about going to Cortina, a tiny area perched high in the Alps, to see some of the mountain events, but getting there from Milan isn’t easy. The trip takes more than five hours on public transportation and requires at least one transfer. To drive there in winter, you need tires with snow chains. Not my cup of tea, or espresso, as it were.
I haven’t visited Milan in ten years and my lingering impression is that it was glamorous and inscrutable, mostly hidden behind dark doorways and glassed-in courtyards. That is to say, it’s the opposite of my family’s Italy — Southern, gregarious, and always sporting some degree of sunburn. I am, sadly, no one’s long-lost daughter in Milan, even with a name like Laura Motta. I am just a lady from New York who could be wearing better shoes.
Still, though, I am excited.
I’ll be seeing four figure skating events – the men’s and ice dance competitions, which have two programs each. These are all in the evening, which leaves most of the day open for sightseeing.
Here’s what I’ll be up to (maybe?) when I’m not at the rink…
(Or maybe I’ll buy tickets to the practices and spend the whole time at the rink… who can know.)
Olympic Milano, a Sort-Of Itinerary
When I travel, my goals for city wandering are pretty straightforward. Generally, I like coffee, bookstores, specialty shops, aimless neighborhood strolling, nice food (not necessarily fancy), pretty interiors, and a glass of wine. Throw in a museum or two and some local history and I’m happy.
Also, a big shoutout to my friend and Milan expert Allison Tibaldi who helped me suss all this out. She is also a figure skating fan. As are all the best among us.
Note that I have pre-booked a few of these just to be safe, including the Armani Prive retrospective, but I have not found tickets especially hard to come by for the Olympic period. Two exceptions — opera performances at La Scala are mostly sold out, and viewings of The Last Supper are booked until May.
Art and Whatnot
Anselm Kiefer at Pirelli HangarBicocca: This permanent exhibit is a 30-minute metro ride from the Piazza di Duomo and features Kiefer’s enormous concrete and lead towers based on the Hebrew Book of Palaces. Admission is free and you can reserve timed tickets online.
In-Play. Design for Sport at ADI Design Museum: Host cities typically stage a multitude of art and culture exhibits that run in tandem with the games. This one, which riffs on the idea of the Olympic Charter and sport as a fundamental human right, can be found at the Piazza Compasso d’Oro, right next to the Cimitero Monumentale.
You could visit the cemetery before or after the design museum. It was Milan’s most fashionable place to be buried in the 19th and 20th Centuries and is filled with, indeed, monumental family mausoleums, many of which were designed by notable architects. This is where the fancy Mottas – no relation – found their eternal rest. It’s a worthwhile stroll if the weather is decent.
Rare Leonardo Mural at Castello Sforzesco: Milan’s 14th Century battlements are now museums that house some of the city’s greatest treasures. Among them, a ceiling mural of mulberry trees painted by Leonardo Da Vinci that was plastered over and obscured for centuries. The mural room, the Salla delle Asse, has been closed for restorations, but will reopen only during the Olympics. Entrance is included with a ticket to the museum (€5), but you’ll also need to sign up for a guided tour to enter the room. At the time of publication, this tour could not be reserved online. A virtual exhibit at the castle will also allow visitors to have a look.
Götterdämerung at La Scala: If you have the opportunity to see an opera at La Scala, go. Playing during the Olympics is Wagner’s Götterdämerung, which is five hours long and a masterpiece. It will also be, if my previous experience at La Scala is any indication, the best night of your life. Patrons wear gowns, sip champagne at the multiple intermissions, and communicate their feelings at curtain call with remorseless fervor.
I saw Gustavo Dudamel conduct Rigoletto at La Scala in 2012, when the maestro didn’t have much experience leading operas. I sat in the rafters. The sound quality was an abomination. The soprano faltered. And when the curtain came down, the audience booed in a howling, unfettered unison. What a night.
Armani Privé Retrospective at Armani/Silos: Twenty-five years of iconic gowns, up close. Run don’t walk.
Plus, a handful of house museums, if that’s your vibe:
Casa Verdi (group reservations only)
Eating and Drinking
I am not the sort of person to pre-book every meal, but I did make a few reservations. I booked lunches at Sandi and La Scaletta. The former is relatively new with a blindingly white interior and a menu that’s packed with buttery pastas, gratins, and roasted meats — comfy dishes that seem sophisticated but not snobby. The latter feels a touch more formal, and does modern takes on Milanese classics.
I’m playing dinners by ear, though I’d love to just order an aperitivo and snacks in the Navigli neighborhood, where there’s plenty of both. It’s also on the way to the ice arena, which saves some running around.
No specific plans for coffee, but Bar Luce, the Wes Anderson-designed cafe at Fondazione Prada, seems like a thing to do, so I will do it. And share the photos.
Day Trips and Little Jaunts, If I Feel Like It
Bergamo (Mountains)
Parma (Food!)
Torino (Mountains!)
Genoa (Food)
Before I Go: One Story About Broadway and Figure Skating
If you plan on watching Olympic figure skating (Why would you not?), keep an ear open for two programs in particular. The short program by US pairs team Emily Chan and Spencer Howe, and the free skate by Georgia’s Anastasia Gubanova. Both, somehow, are skating to music from the original Broadway cast recording of Ghost: The Musical. (There is actually a third Ghost: The Musical program in figure skating this season, by China’s Zhu Yi, but she did not qualify for the Olympics. Imagine if she had.)
The odds of this happening all in the same season boggle the mind. I also have no idea why all of these Ghost: The Musical programs utilize the same cut of music – the one that includes an anguished clip of Broadway’s Caissie Levy, as Molly, gasping, “Sam, is that you?” to the apparition of her dead boyfriend.
I’ve seen Ghost: The Musical. It opened on Broadway in 2012 and lasted for about eight weeks, and its legacy consists of exactly two things: The show included a two-story projection of a man’s bare ass, used as a stand-in for an onstage sex scene. And it marked the Broadway debut of Da’Vine Joy Randolph. She earned a Tony nomination for playing Oda Mae – no mean feat when you consider that she was forced to sing the lyric, “Goin’ to Mauritius / Where the crab cakes are delicious.”
I suppose there is now a third part of this legacy – that it’s become a figure skating war horse.
Are there really only TWO Ghost programs at the Olympics? In my mind, there's at least 1-2 per discipline, but I've clearly exaggerated.
Wish I had this guide when I rolled through Milan in my mid-20s as part of a larger European tour. All I remember is that my friend, who was in banking and made much more money that me and our other friend, decreed that she could not bear to stay in another bargain hotel in Milan, of all places, and insisted we let her splurge on the hotel room for all of us. So my best memory of Milan was sleeping in a great bed for the first time in two weeks.