The hidden secret in the architecture of Armani Hotel in Milan

Giorgio Armani is an icon for Milan. Since its debut in '75, the designer known in fashion circles as King George has left a deep and lasting imprint on the city – especially since his business expanded from fashion to furniture, art, catering, publishing. The centre of this empire is the titanic building of Montenapoleone, which houses both the boutique of the brand, its café-pastry shop, its bookstore, two restaurants including one devoted only to sushi, its florist, its spa, its night club and, finally, its hotel. Needless to say, Armani likes to leave his signature wherever he goes – and in fact, even the building that houses much of his business hides, in the architecture of the roof, a huge A visible only from above. 

The original building in via Manzoni in Milan takes up an entire block and was built in 1937 by the architect Enrico Agostino Griffini, the architect behind various works in Milan such as the façade of Santa Maria Alla Fontana, the aedicule of the Porcile family at the Monumental Cemetery but also the Palazzo dell'Arengario that today houses the Museum of the '900. 

Griffini was one of the main exponents of Italian Rationalism, an architectural current that recalled classicism in the very calculated use of mathematical proportions, balance and functionalism – values entirely in line with the style of Giorgio Armani who, in fact, added his quid to the building: two panoramic floors entirely made of glass that raise the structure of the hotel even higher on the horizon of Montenapoleone. It's precisely this structure that creates the A on the roof of the building.