There is no doubt about it — people of all ages in the urban centre of Milan dress well. Their style is trendy, bold and alluring. I would not describe Milan street style as edgy or arty, but it’s totally fashion forward in a more classic, but spunky way. And quite glitzy. There is a unique sense of confidence in the way that Milanese people dress.
Clothing is form fitting to say the least, for both men and women. No voluminous trends in Milan! Skinnies, cigarette pants and straight leg jeans worn with short leather jackets, sunglasses and designer handbag are the uniform. And I mean UNIFORM.
Trenches were also popular, as were scarves, belts and leggings. Surprisingly, because we didn’t see it anywhere else, many women sport low rise jeans with flashy belts. Lots of shiny belts, handbag hardware and eyewear. It’s not my look but I can certainly appreciate it on others.
Not everyone is Milan is wearing designer fashions. People around the quadrilatero della moda (the fashion district) are especially branded, from head to toe, but the rest of Milan is less so (apart from the handbag — it must be part of the culture to sport a designer handbag). Some of my favourite ensembles were stylish casual, a practical look that ladies in Milan have down to a T.
The footwear on the streets was diverse. From all sorts of boots, booties, flat and heeled fashion sneakers, and oxfords on chilly days, to ballet flats, pumps and loafers on milder days. Lots of all star Converse too. For the most part, people wore flats and low heels because it’s a society that commutes on foot. But high heels and mega platforms were definitely visible – more so than in any other Euro city on this trip, especially down the Via Montenapoleone (the Rodeo Drive of Milan).
Street style is virtually 90% neutrally toned: lots of black, huge amounts of earthy shades and mushroom tones, quite a lot of white, light grey, dark blue and the odd dose of pastel pink, yellow and green. Saturated colours are few and far between. Basically it was just me sporting my bright scarves, turtlenecks and handbags like a traffic beacon in the middle of the city. Oh well. I’m not giving up the bright pops of colour that are characteristic of my ensembles. Not even in Milan.
It makes sense that The Sartorialist captures a large proportion of his blog photography here. For an effective and entertaining fashion fix, sit yourself down at an outside trattoria for the day and watch the fashion and style world go past. You won’t be disappointed because the adorable blokes and kids are just as well dressed as the pretty ladies. We saw more cool dudes in Milan than any of the other cities on our trip.
That wraps up our fashion and style reporting for this Euro trip. We hope you enjoyed reading our posts as much as we enjoyed prepping them. A big thank you to Greg for literally taking thousands of pictures so that we could bring back killer images for you. Over the last few days I was determined to get some photos of him too, so I started keeping my camera close to hand and taking many spontaneous shots, like he does. I think I got a few nice ones of my sweetie.
