Wine as a Passport: A Luxury Milan Escape
Franciacorta, lake light, elegant trains, and the wines of Lombardy. By Jamie Knee
Dear friends,
Welcome back to another beautiful, dreamy Sunday.
Some cities are all softness. Milan is something else entirely. It is polished, composed, beautifully edited, and quietly seductive. The glamour here does not need to announce itself. It lives in a courtyard behind an old doorway, in the hush of a grand hotel lobby, in a perfectly cut jacket, in the first aperitivo of the evening, and in the understanding that style is not a performance but a way of moving through the world.
For the luxury traveler, Milan is a city to savor. For the luxury wine traveler, it is even better, because the city is also a gateway to some of northern Italy’s most beautiful and most drinkable escapes.
When deciding to visit Milan, I would begin with a beautiful base in the city itself. Four Seasons Hotel Milano remains one of the great addresses, a former 15th century convent in the fashion district, while Bvlgari Hotel Milano offers its own private road, garden, and deeply Milanese kind of luxury between Brera and Via Montenapoleone. Both feel less like places to sleep and more like ways to understand Milan properly.
What I especially love is that Milan does not ask you to choose between city and escape. The train does the work beautifully. From Milano Centrale, Como is about 40 minutes, Lecco about 40 minutes, Varenna 64 minutes, and Pavia about 32 minutes on Trenord routes Lugano is just over an hour from Milan, around 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes, depending on the service. In other words, Milan makes it wonderfully easy to spend the morning in the city and the afternoon by a lake, in wine country, or somewhere that feels entirely different by lunch.
And then there is the wine, which is really where Milan begins to seduce me.
In Milan itself, I want to start with Franciacorta. The Franciacorta Consortium describes not only a rigorously protected sparkling wine territory, but also a developed wine road designed around art, nature, and tourism, which is exactly why it feels so at home in a city like Milan. Franciacorta is what I want at aperitivo: fine beaded, poised, and quietly celebratory, the sort of bottle that belongs on a terrace with oysters, little bites, and beautifully dressed people beginning their evening. It is the sparkling wine of polished intentions.
With lunch in Milan, I would move to Lugana. Ascovilo, which brings together Lombardy’s wine consortia, describes Lugana as one of the region’s mineral, long lived white wines, and the Lugana consortium notes the modern emphasis on Turbiana, with the wines often showing freshness, floral notes, citrus, and almond. That makes Lugana one of the loveliest possible companions for a long northern Italian lunch, especially with seafood, lighter pasta, or an elegant plate of vegetables. It has brightness, but it also has enough shape to feel serious.
If I were taking the train to Como, I would keep the glass pale and luminous. Lugana works beautifully there too, but Como also feels like the right place for another glass of Franciacorta, especially if the day is all lake light, boat views, and hotel terraces. If I were staying overnight, Villa d’Este is one of the great addresses on Lake Como, a 16th century residence turned grand hotel that still feels like the sort of place where time slows down on purpose.
For Varenna, I want something just as elegant but a little softer in mood. Trenord places the journey from Milan at just over an hour, and that is one of the great luxuries of this whole region: you do not have to fight to get somewhere beautiful. You simply board the train and let the landscape do the rest. Once there, I still want a cold white, perhaps Lugana again, perhaps Franciacorta if the day begins early and beautifully. Varenna has that slightly more romantic, cinematic quality that asks for a slower pace and a second glass by the water.
If I go to Lecco, I start to think about how the mood shifts at the edge of the lake and the mountains. Lecco is only about 40 minutes from Milan by train, and it feels like a place where the wine can take a slightly more serious turn. This is where I begin thinking about Valtellina, the alpine expression of Nebbiolo that Lombardy does so beautifully. Ascovilo points to Lombardy’s alpine reds as one of the region’s most distinctive wine identities, and that makes perfect sense here. Valtellina is what I want as the light begins to soften, perhaps with a more substantial lunch or a later afternoon meal that leans into mountain air and northern Italian structure.
If I drift further into the region, toward Pavia or the southern side of Lombardy, I would let the city soften and the wine become a little quieter. Pavia is just over half an hour by train from Milan, which makes it wonderfully easy for a lunch escape. Here I would think in terms of whites for the beginning of the day and then perhaps a lighter red later, something that reminds you Milan is surrounded by more wine than many visitors realize. Even when you are not in a famous headline region, Lombardy keeps offering another table, another train, another bottle.
And if the trip turns northward to Lugano, the mood changes again. Lugano Region says the city is just about an hour from Milan by train, and that nearness is part of the pleasure. It gives you a Swiss Italian interlude without requiring a full relocation. Here, I want whites that feel alpine, clean, and crystalline. Even if the bottle comes from just over the border or further into northern Italy, the mood should match the setting: precise, mineral, composed. Lugano is a little sleeker, a little cooler, and the glass should know that.
The food should follow the same rhythm.
In Milan, I want a proper aperitivo first, because no city does that transition from day to evening quite the same way. Then I want risotto alla Milanese, or a delicate seafood dish, or something modern and refined in Brera. By the lakes, the table shifts toward fish, vegetables, and lighter pastas. In the alpine direction, a red begins to make more sense. What I love is that none of this ever feels forced. Milan and the surrounding region understand how to let appetite unfold gracefully.
That, to me, is the real luxury of Milan.
It is not only the fashion, though of course there is that. It is not only the hotels, though they are beautiful. It is the way the city becomes a base for a fuller experience of northern Italy. A place where one elegant aperitivo can lead to a train the next morning, and that train can lead to lake light, alpine reds, crisp whites, and one more reason to stay a little longer than planned.
Milan, for me, is not only a city. It is an opening.
A polished doorway into luxury wine travel, into Lombardy, into the lakes, into Franciacorta and Lugana and Valtellina, into a way of traveling that feels chic without being loud and deeply pleasurable without ever trying too hard.
And honestly, that may be reason enough to book the ticket.
Until next Sunday,
may your glass continue to guide you,
your curiosity remain wide open,
and your travels be filled with beauty.
With love from the road, xo
Jamie Knee
I write, speak, and present for the wine and travel world, partnering with destinations, wineries, and hospitality brands to tell stories that bring people closer to place through culture, beauty, and the glass.
I had never heard of Lugana, but it sounds lovely! Another wine to find and drink this summer! Beautiful piece, Jamie.