A short pedestrian street linking the Piazza del Duomo with the Piazza San Babila, Corso Vittorio Emanuele II is one of the busiest commercial streets in Milan, packed with shoppers from morning until late evening and lined with the flagships of Italian and international high-street brands. The route follows the line of a much older medieval street, the Corsia dei Servi, that connected the cathedral with the eastern city gates. The current pedestrianised character of the street dates from 1985, when the city closed it to motorised traffic as part of a wider redesign of the historic centre. The result has been a steady increase in shopping footfall and a corresponding rise in rents, which now place the street among the most expensive in Italy on a per-square-metre basis. A row of arcaded buildings along the southern side of the street provides covered shopping in all weathers and frames a series of small piazzas and side passages leading to the Duomo and to side streets running north and south. The northern side, by contrast, is lined with taller modern buildings, the result of partial reconstruction after the heavy Allied bombing of August 1943, which destroyed substantial sections of the surrounding neighbourhood. The street is named for the first king of a unified Italy, Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, who took the throne in 1861. The name was applied to the older Corsia dei Servi in 1864 in a wave of patriotic re-naming following Italian unification. A statue of the king on horseback stands at the western end at the entrance to the Piazza del Duomo. Shopping along the street covers the predictable Italian and international high-street brands, with a small concentration of cinemas and food courts at the eastern end near Piazza San Babila and a cluster of bookshops, music stores and electronics outlets in the middle sections. Three large historic department stores cluster nearby, including the Rinascente flagship that backs onto the Duomo. A short walk from the metro stops at Duomo and San Babila on the M1 red line, the Corso links the cathedral with the more elegant boutiques of the Quadrilatero d Oro, the fashion district immediately to the north. Whether on a shopping mission or simply for a stroll between two of the busiest squares in the city, the street offers a vivid slice of contemporary Milanese commercial life.

Type: Street

Address: Corso Vittorio Emanuele II, Milan, Italy