Moving towards the Expo… in English

The paper that you’re reading now is not alone in presenting Milan’s resources to the international community. The fact that the city has long been northern Italy’s most cosmopolitan metropolis has encouraged the foundation of many English-language publications, and possibly the fact that Milan will host the next Universal Expo in 2015 has spurred further growth in this area. The latest arrival in the field is “Where Milan,” an Italian-U.S.-owned publication, by a group whose “Where” magazines have reached a total of 90 million copies a year.

When searching for international publications, clubs and associations are often a good bet because they often produce a journal for their members. One example is the Benvenuto Club, which has been operating in Milan for 43 years and publishes the monthly Benvenuto. This has a lot of information on exhibitions, events, and the activities and tours organized by the Club and its members. The circulation is currently about 500 copies.

Another long-running publication is The Informer, which was a printed magazine from 1987 to 1999 distributed to subscribers, printed on quality glossy paper in a handy A5 format. In 2000, the magazine’s publishers took the decision to go entirely on-line, so that it could deliver in-depth, practical information to readers wherever they are. It is a subscription-based publication, though “The Survival Guide to Italy” – the key issues for anyone coming to Italy – is available to all free of charge.

This brings us to Hello Milano, founded by Art’Idea in 1996 in order to provide tourists with comprehensive information on the most important sights, museums, shops, restaurants and nightlife in the city, succinct enough for a tourist who was in Milan for an average of 2.4 days. The result was a monthly with a relatively high circulation – 20,000 copies – in tabloid format, which meant that there was enough room for a city map on the centre fold. The publication progressively changed as the publishers realized that it was being used by two groups of people: international tourists, and the ex-pat community.

Easy Milano, founded in 2000, is a two-weekly classified adverts publication, printed on glossy paper, which provides a very useful service for international people coming to live in Milan for a few years with all that this entails, such as locating services, buying furniture when they arrive, selling it when they leave, and so forth. The publication can be read and downloaded online at www.easymilano.it, where you can also place classified ads.

Several English-language publications are distributed primarily in hotels, such as Luxos, available free in rooms and suites of luxury hotels in Milan, Venice, Florence and Rome. As its name suggests, this lifestyle magazine is a guide to everything that comes under the label “luxury” in these four cities, including the highlights of Milan’s fashion business. On its website, www.luxos.com, the publication has opted to limit the number of listings in each category – restaurants, nightlife etc. – to just ten, so that readers with limited time available do not have to sift through mounds of information.

Where Milan, the latest arrival, is also a magazine distributed in hotels, and it takes a different approach, with hundreds of listings in very small, TimeOut style print. It has a city map, and detailed descriptions of the venues in categories including shopping, museums, restaurants, bars, sports and so forth. At present the events section is minimal, but during the press conference, editor-in-chief Andrea Jarach said that this would be expanded. The press kit accompanying the magazine at its launch states that the average length of a tourist’s stay has now dropped to 1.6 nights which means that, considering the number of publications available, there is no shortage of reading material on the bedside table!

Then there are the publications issued by local government authorities. www.turismo.milano.it is a portal with a great deal of information on the city and its cultural highlights.

 Milano Mese is a monthly tourist guide published by the Province of Milan, in Italian and English, listing events, concerts, venues, museums etc., distributed in various locations in the city, comprehensive in its coverage though obviously a publication produced by translation from Italian rather than being edited in English.

Lastly, Speak Up, a newsstand monthly published by De Agostini Periodici, continues in its mission of improving the English spoken by the people of Italy. Come on, everybody, begin began begun, we'll get there by 2015!
 

Henry Neuteboom