The Portello District, the new district on the outskirts of Milan

The Portello district yesterday and today

A lot of time has passed since the old Portello street. The Portello was a minor gateway leading from the big city to the countryside; now the old name connotes instead a neighborhood new in aesthetics, but with a nostalgic soul. Once here stood the Alfa Romeo plant, active from 1906 to 1986. Having abandoned the great industrial season, the neighborhood has reinvented itself as a residential and commercial area, with futuristic architectural lines and a green soul.
Our journey begins at the foot of the bike/pedestrian walkway on Viale De Gasperi. We will leave the old QT8 neighborhood, built and celebrated in 1947 as a wide-ranging project for the evacuees of the last war, already at the time considered particularly innovative and enlightened for its attention to green spaces. Even today, the first stop on our itinerary is pure green: 70,000 square meters of parkland and grassy expanses, surrounded by the city, the old buildings of the Gnocchi Foundation, the Portello shopping center, the CityLife connected by another bike/pedestrian walkway.

Portello Park

We go down and up in this park: hills in Milan, modeled after the dear Mount Stella not far away, made with the waste materials from the construction sites and demolitions that allowed the renewal of this area. Dominating everything is Helix Hill with its two walkways that never meet and culminating, at the top of the path, with the DNA sculpture: a climb we recommend to everyone, each at his or her own pace!
Leaving the park, we skirt the complex of the Don Carlo Gnocchi Foundation. Our guided tour continues to the Portello Shopping Center: this place was conceived as a futuristic reinterpretation of the ancient squares, which have always been overlooked by businesses. And then, between largo Zanuso, via Magistretti and via Sambonet (not surprisingly, names of architects and designers recently discovered), the itinerary ends. Will our guides have convinced you that the new Milan is as curious and fascinating as that of the historic center?