Eugi Gufo's siteEugi Gufo

Few people know it, but in Melegnano (in the province of Milan) there is something more than the famous motorway toll booth. Melegnano is, in fact, a town of ancient origin and, naturally, it has its own historic centre.

Few people know this and even fewer care, so the local administration tries to ease its inferiority complex by displaying banners like this:

On the other hand, they also do things that are actually useful for correcting the collective imagination: the information panels about historical sites to be seen in the town would also be useful in Milan (where, according to the average tourist, there are only the Duomo, La Scala and the Sforza Castle).

As if that were not enough, along the banks of the Lambro river there is a panoramic diagram showing all places of historical and cultural interest.

But what are these places? For example, within the municipal area there is a large 13th-century Visconti castle.

Or rather, it would be more accurate to say that there is half a castle, since of its four sides only the one in the previous photo and half of two others are still standing. The fourth side is completely missing. As a result, the castle courtyard actually looks like the (rather deserted) garden of a villa.

As a rule, I do not publish photos of churches just for the sake of it. It is just that this one struck me as unusually narrow.

The Town Hall building has been enlarged in an almost vandalistic way (see the part on the left).

But you can look at the beautiful buildings of the historic centre on your own. So I shall go back to telling you about the things that others tend to hide. The most common street lamps in the centre are shaped like strawberries.

The most widespread benches are often installed in their minimalist version: without backrests.

On the door of a bar near the former hydroelectric power station I noticed an interesting notice:

The structure of the power station is still standing. At one time it also served to power the adjacent mill, built in the first half of the 19th century. Somewhere I read that the plant should soon be modernised and put back into operation.

I was unable to photograph the still-intact turbine (it is enclosed in a dark building whose windows produced monstrous reflections), so make do with this object of inexplicable purpose.

Do you think there is anything else interesting in Melegnano? Only two things remain that I could report exclusively. First of all, in some areas the building development seems to have gone mad. I mean both the overcrowding and the clash of styles.

In other areas, obsolete houses peacefully border on modern ones.

If, after reading this report, you still have not managed to form a complete impression of Melegnano, do not worry: not even I, who have been there, could say what the existence of this town actually means.
In any case, lovers of historic centres may well pay it a visit: they will find a number of interesting things.