De Montel Terme Milano
A Milanese story, unique in the world
Once upon a time there was Milan at the beginning of the 20th century, a city that looked to London and Paris as models. It was an industrious and industrial Milan, vertical and fascinated by speed.
A singular character
In this dynamic and modern Milan, there lived Giuseppe De Montel, banker, nobleman, silk entrepreneur, president of the Clubino - the meeting place of the city's elite. They say he was reserved, refined and elegant like a dandy, highly intelligent, a great horse lover by family tradition.
With a sense of the grandiose
Reflecting an uncommon sense of beauty, De Montel, owner of racehorses, wanted grand stables for his thoroughbreds. He therefore entrusted the project to the architects Arrigo Cantoni and Paul Vietti Violi, the same architects who would also design the Hippodrome of San Siro.
The Stables, an architectural jewel
Thus the Scuderie De Montel was born, an architectural jewel with Art Nouveau features and Belle Époque echoes that marked the 1920s. With their iconic gables, clock, interior colonnade and horse stalls, the Scuderie De Montel was immediately perceived as a mythical place, a monument.
Horses, a collective cult
In those days, horses were the champions for whom people cheered and the Hippodrome del Galoppo, built in 1920, was the centre of this collective cult, with races, bets, records and chronicles, where the name De Montel often recurred.
It would not last forever. In the years between the wars, the De Montel Stables had already been sold, the jockeys dismissed, the activities suspended.
The Stables, initially entrusted to the management of a congregation of nuns, first fell into neglect and then into decay and ruin.
The happy ending: from ruin to rebirth
Despite everything, even during the decades of neglect, the Scuderie De Montel, so full of memories and suggestions, have continued to be scrutinised, photographed and loved. The municipality's participation in the international Reinventing Cities competition in 2019 consecrates the new project to transform the area.
The Stables become a unique Thermal Park
The new destination of the monumental stables as a metropolitan thermal park in a unique setting was made possible thanks to a primary good, such as water. Because it is precisely the thermal water recognised and certified by the Ministry of Health - extracted from the depths of the earth - that is the vital spark of Terme De Montel, Milan's new landmark from 2025.