Milan's leading attraction, the Duomo. Photo / Mike Van Niekerk
Mike van Niekerk takes in the art, architecture and cocktails of Milan
As we settled down at a sidewalk table in Milan the waiter deposited a large plate of savoury bites on our table.
If you order an Aperol spritz or negroni at cocktail hour in Italy it usually comes with a couple of "spuntini". But this stack of snacks could have fed a small family.
Looking around we noticed waiters at adjacent establishments bearing similarly generous plates to their customers. Often the best you'll do close to the main tourist attractions is a bowl of chips, but we were on a quiet, leafy back street.
Maybe this little cluster of cafes had raised the bar to compete for repeat neighbourhood business? It worked for us. We were back the next day, having fallen easily into the Italian rhythm of cocktail hour, when the sun glints off glowing red spritzes in the hands of friends meeting at crowded tables up and down the streets and in the piazzas.
One of northern Italy's mysteries is how a population that starts the evening with cocktails before heading out for a five-course, late-night meal can emerge each day as underweight as the day before. The French paradox is the Italian one, too.
Seeing we're in the world's fashion capital, it seemed appropriate a high proportion of the passing parade were model-thin and finely — even expensively — dressed. Which is a clue to why Milan is a rising star in European tourism, having challenged Rome in 2016 as the country's most popular city to visit.
It doesn't have the Colosseum, the Vatican, Piazza Navona or the Pantheon, nor any attractions on a similar scale. But neither does it have an exorbitant bed tax and, despite the official statistics, the hordes of tourists are hard to spot.
Unless you visit the Duomo, Milan's leading attraction, you could imagine there are not that many tourists in the city. Not that it is empty. At the heart of the fastest-growing economic region in Europe, Milan is a thriving city with a core of solid, low-rise 19th-century stone facades, dotted with palazzos, ornate churches and a handful of exceptional modern towers.
But it is the contemporary attractions in particular that make it a serious destination.
First among these is the Via Montenapoleone fashion district, the world's most delicious showcase of extravagant ready-to-wear. Come here for endless entertainment, browsing through the high-end boutiques and the sensation you've walked into the pages of Viva magazine.
There are other fashion destinations around Milan — especially when the shows are on — but here, in what is also known as the Quadrilatero della Moda, is where it's at.
Second drawcard: Milan is home to two of the most imaginative contemporary art spaces in the world. In the case of the Prada Foundation, I was reminded of one of the comments about Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Museum when it first opened in Bilbao, Spain: "When a building is that good, f*** the art." Except that designer Miuccia Prada has worked with architect Rem Koolhaas to create a stunning arts complex to house a seriously stimulating collection of works.
The journey through the foundation begins in a converted tower, entirely covered in gold leaf, and wends through different buildings before ending up in a kitschy period cafe designed by film-maker Wes Anderson. Three hours passed in a flash.
The other venue is the Pirelli Hangar Bicocca, which is all about the art, being gigantic converted workshops where train locomotives and carriages were built for most of the 20th century.
It is now the permanent home for the German artist Anselm Kiefer's Seven Heavenly Palaces. You reach the installation through large darkened spaces filled with temporary displays before entering a six-storey-high space the size of a rugby field where Kiefer's crooked concrete towers stand in a dusky light.
I've visited many of the world's great galleries but this artwork in this space, symbolising levels of spirituality, was one of my most profound gallery experiences. The sheer scale, as you wander around the space, is awe-inspiring.
Both venues are on the outskirts and fairly hard to reach without resorting to a taxi, but getting around Milan otherwise is a breeze. Walking is easy in the city and it is well served by public transport. For the scenic route, lovely old trams rattle around the streets.
For speed, there is a highly efficient underground metro.
Almost a quarter of Milan was destroyed by bombing towards the end of World War II. Like most of the city's heritage buildings, the Duomo has been repaired. Although it's an architectural hodge-podge begun in the 1300s and finished in the 1920s, the cathedral is a gorgeous white structure, newly cleaned and gleaming at one end of the vast piazza in front of it.
Buy a ticket for the interior if you wish, but be sure to buy a ticket to go up on to the roof, where you will get spectacular views of the city through an array of hovering stone saints.
Back down in the piazza, you're sure to wander through the vast Victor Emmanuele II arcade, but the best clothes shopping in Milan is at the multi-storey La Rinascente department store.
If you time your visit it will be cocktail hour when you've finished, in which case go up to the store's rooftop terrace bar for an even better view of Milan and the Duomo. The spuntini here are some of the best.
Getting there: Emirates flies from Auckland to Milan, via Dubai.