Milan is a vibrant city full of contemporary culture spanning the performing arts through fashion and design.

If you love the arts or if you work in a related field, you’ll pass through Milan at some point for a meeting or a conference or an exposition. (And lucky you!)

If you visit for a conference, show, or meeting, you’ll enjoy an active, living metropolitan area and—if you have pockets of free time or can allow yourself an extra day or two for a visit—you can still see the best of the history the city has to offer.

And if you plan to visit Milan purely for the history, you can cover the highlights in a handful of days. (The city suffered extensive bombardment during World War II, though a few key sites remain.)

As I’ll always tell you when it comes to trip planning: Get a guidebook and see as much as you can via guided tours. The history, culture, and life of a place comes to life in entirely different ways when you have a guidebook plus a guide.

In Milan, the city’s official tourist office has several different guided tours available. If none of the group tours fit your schedule or your interest—as they haven’t for us and for friends in the past—you can hire a licensed guide to create a tour customized to what you’d like to learn. We found our guide, Fedra Pavesi, via the official tourist bureau. (We’d highly recommend her, too!)

The Milan Cathedral

To confuse everyone who’d think “Duomo” and think Florence, you’ll also find a cathedral in Milan called the Duomo. Or, more formally, called the Metropolitan Cathedral-Basilica of the Nativity of Saint Mary. (Yeah. A mouthful. “The Duomo” is easier to say and to remember.)

However, while the Duomo in Florence has its stunning dome (really, you must see it), it has nothing on the sheer immensity of the Duomo in Milan.

Milan’s utterly enormous cathedral is second in size in Italy only to the Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome, also known as the seat of the Roman Catholic Church.

Begun in the late 1300s, the cathedral reached its current state of completion in—wait for it—the 1960s. Yet because it’s situated on problematically soft and shifting ground, the cathedral is a constant construction site due to the perpetual restoration needed to keep it standing.

Unlike the Florentine Duomo or Saint Peter’s Basilica, Milan’s Duomo is Gothic in architecture. This thing has more spires than I have ever seen, and you can admire them best from the rooftop, which an elevator will take you to visit if you purchase a ticket. (And you really should.)

The interior of the cathedral pales in impressiveness to the rooftop, though the size of the cathedral required a grandeur of stained-glass windows that cannot fail to wow you.

Sforza Castle

Originally built by the Visconti family in the late 13th and early 14th century—like the Duomo—the fortified Sforza Castle changed significantly after Francesco Sforza took control of it in 1450, building it out more fully into a secure residence.

Unfortunately, it didn’t linger in splendor long; by the early 1500s, wars and troubles damaged it significantly; by the 1520s, it had become a weapons depot. From there ensued several changings-of-hands spanning through Napoleonic times through the Second World War, all of which left the castle with little of its Renaissance past other than the general structure.

Milan has restored a bit the exterior and parts of the interior, but don’t visit the Sforza Castle expecting much in terms of insights into the life and history of the Visconti family, the Sforzas, or the Italian Renaissance.

Instead, you’ll find on the interior a collection of museums, including collections of armory, furniture and wooden sculptures, paintings and decorative arts, archaeological artifacts, and musical instruments—along with, and most famously, a dedicated space featuring an unfinished work of Michelangelo Buonarroti, which he’d intended for his tomb but hadn’t finished when he died.

The space dedicated to this work of Michelangelo’s, titled the Pietà Rondanini, is a white-walled room with lighting that illustrates how the artist intended the shadow of the sculpture to evolve over the hours of the day.

La Scala

La Scala is one of the most famous opera and ballet theaters in the world operating today—and the only one still intact that was built in the late 18th century entirely in wood framing. Despite candle- and lamp-lighting and the cooking fires maintained by people in their opera boxes during performances, the theater never burned.

Though the lucky can buy tickets for a pretty penny to see a performance at La Scala, anyone can buy tickets for a tour of the building when the theater doesn’t have performances and rehearsals underway.

A tour will show you the theater, give you information on its history and the history of opera and ballet in Milan, and help you appreciate this building’s international importance. (It doesn’t look like much from the exterior, but the interior will impress!)

Pinacoteca di Brera

This stunning art collection, founded by Napoleon in the early 1800s, has paintings spanning periods from the 15th century through the 18th century, predominantly by Italian artists.

As I spent a period of my life in intense study of the Italian Renaissance humanists, I love looking at art from the same period—so I had a visit to the Pinacoteca di Brera on my “must” list. (If these eras of art don’t appeal, I’d recommend you skip it.) I had particular interest in seeing the museum’s relatively expansive collection of Carlo Crivelli work.

You could easily spend an entire day in this museum—and you probably should, if you’ve come for the art. If you have limited time or want to pass through only the periods or works that interest you most, you can absolutely do that, too. (Just read my guide to approaching landmark museums before you do, for tips.)

And if you visit the Pinacoteca di Brera or decide to pass, the neighborhood surrounding the museum and the adjacent art school has lovely cobblestone pedestrian streets lined with boutiques and cafes for shopping and people watching (and enjoying an aperitivo milanese!).

Museo Pezzo Poldi

Hey, I love museums—including art museums. However, even I hit capacity after a certain point.

Personally, I can only do so much straight-up art in one day. After a certain moment, my brain hits appreciation saturation and my mind starts to gloss over what I see.

Because I’d spent one part of a day in the Pinacoteca di Brera, I couldn’t appreciate yet another one of the art museums in Milan—of which there are plenty, covering all sorts of periods.

Hitting my saturation point with art does not mean I’ve had my fill of museums, though!

Eager for another museum of a different type, we decided to make our second museum of the day the truly fantastic Pezzo di Poldi, which does not get the credit it deserves in the guidebooks I’ve seen. Talk about a hidden gem!

Donated to the public by the owner upon his death, the Pezzo di Poldi was the home of Gian Giacomo Poldi Pezzoli and houses his extensive and quirky collection of art and artifacts in a series of nearly forty rooms, all beautifully decorated and arranged. And the museum continues to collect artwork and artifacts, making this a living and changing collection even long after Pezzoli’s original gift.

The rooms tantalize the senses with varying décor, colors, and collection pieces, from stunning paintings to sculpture, glass and tableware, clocks and sundials, arms and armor, furniture, and beyond. Even more delightful: The art and artifacts range in style, country of origin, and era and are arranged in combinations of all the above in the different rooms.

Also, for this Renaissance Italian humanism lover, I had to especially appreciate that Pezzoli had decorated one of the rooms in honor of Dante. Don’t miss it!

Food and Eating Ideas for Your Trip

As we stayed in the tourist center and had limited time to linger over meals, we focused our food and drink in Milan on one sit-down restaurant meal per day and snacks and treats to eat on the go. (Our hotel had breakfast included—which also helped.)

For snacks and treats to eat while in Milan or for food-focused gifts to take home as gifts, you must stop in at Peck.

For easy, healthful picnics and snacks that you can take with you or can eat on-site, we fell in love with Erbert.

For the best pizza we had in central Milan (and we tried more than one) go to Aqua & Farina. Go early, because as the dining period progresses, a line starts to form. (Alas, the restaurant does not have a website as of this writing, but you can find it not far from the Duomo on Largo Corsia dei Servi.)

And because everyone who visits Italy has gelato at some point (right?), I recommend trying RivaReno, a small Italian chain. They have a location in the Brera neighborhood.

You’ll Find Something to Love in Milan

Now that you’ve reached the end of this article, you likely wonder what happened to my mention of a visit to Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper, housed in the Santa Maria delle Grazie monastery’s refrectory.

Alas, you need to book tickets well in advance to see the Last Supper, and we missed the window. As our guide and a friend of mine who lives in Milan have told me that I really should see it, I’ll keep trying to get tickets ahead of each visit.

Do note, though, that a trip to see the church without tickets to see the Last Supper will only disappoint you: The church suffered heavy bombing during the Second World War, and not much of interest remains. Many other churches of interest exist in Milan, including the Duomo, so see those instead. (And if you want to check out a personal favorite, pop into the Santa Maria presso San Satiro to marvel at its optical illusion, created in the 1400s. You’ll only need a few minutes to walk up and down the church’s aisles to see the magic, which really does wow.)

Milan has so much to offer as a major metropolitan hub! It’s one of the foremost international centers of contemporary art, culture, and design. If you get a chance to visit, whether as a tourist or as a business visitor, you’re in for a treat.