It was towards the end of my visit to Italy and at this point, I was no longer thinking of running from one place to another. I will be flying out of Milan that evening and there was no point running all over the place now. I was just staying at the city center and for me that means that Piazza del Duomo, where the Milan Cathedral is. There are a few important monuments here but I have moved on to the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. While not exactly a historical monument like the Milan Cathedral or the Royal Palace, arguably, the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II gets more visitors compared to the others.

The Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II is at its core a shopping arcade. It is composed of two arcades which intersect. What is probably its most prominent feature is the glass ceiling. This was a popular design choice at the time simply because it just looks great. It is also meant to impress because it is hard to make something like this. The two arcades intersect at the middle and this is covered by a large glass dome. Obviously, the glass roof and dome allow light to get in the arcade making this one prestigious shopping arcade and ultimately became the predecessor to the modern shopping mall. Indeed there would be several modern shopping malls which would incorporate glass roofs and they can point directly to the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II as their inspiration.

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