Isola, from cut off to the coolest neighborhood in Milan

An island with no sea

Milan really does have everything, an island included. Except that here there’s no water: what surrounds it are railway tracks. That odd piece of geography is where Isola’s identity comes from — a neighborhood that for decades stayed almost a small world of its own, separate from the rest of the city.

Today it’s one of the most dynamic, creative and unconventional corners of Milan. In 2023 Time Out magazine ranked it fourth among the coolest neighborhoods in Europe, and the rest of the world found out about it.

What makes Isola so appealing is above all the contrast. On one side there are streets that still feel almost like a small town, with neighborhood shops, the old balcony houses and long-standing bars. On the other, a few steps away, there’s the futuristic Porta Nuova skyline, the Bosco Verticale and the contemporary architecture that redrew the face of the city.

It’s exactly this coexistence of past and future that makes it one of the most interesting areas to live in and to visit in Milan today.

Where it is

The Isola neighborhood sits north of central Milan, bounded to the south by Porta Garibaldi railway station and the Porta Nuova district, and to the north by the Zara metro stop (lines M3 and M5) and Milano Centrale station. Over the years it has grown into the new center of Milan, standing alongside the classic one around the Duomo.

How to get here from the airports and the stations is in getting to Isola.

How Isola got its name: a neighborhood in constant change

The name already tells part of the story. From the second half of the nineteenth century onward, as the railway network expanded, the tracks ended up physically separating this area from the rest of Milan. It was a genuine urban island, hard to reach and long considered a working-class outskirt.

Before the Porta Nuova development, before piazza Gae Aulenti and the link to corso Como, Isola was connected to the rest of the city by two bridges only, the Bussa flyover and the Farini one, looking down on a river where trains ran instead of water.

Over time, though, that distance became part of its appeal. The neighborhood held on to many of its original features while a completely new Milan took shape around it.

Walking through Isola today means crossing several eras within a few streets: Liberty-style buildings and rationalist architecture, courtyards and balcony houses, shop shutters decorated with street art and new contemporary buildings. Redevelopment transformed the area deeply, without erasing its memory.

The result is a neighborhood that manages to hold together long-established trattorias and fine-dining restaurants, vintage shops and independent boutiques, craft workshops and art galleries, murals and new urban spaces.

Isola has become the meeting point between two souls of Milan: the working-class, unvarnished one of the balcony houses, and the vertical, international one of Porta Nuova, with the tallest skyscrapers in Italy and the Bosco Verticale.

The murals and the shutters painted with trams, plants and faces come from Isola’s street-art years, when street artists were painting the gray walls.

What Isola feels like

The best thing about Isola is perhaps its rare ability to change without losing itself.

Here the old greengrocer can sit next door to a contemporary art gallery, a fish trattoria can share a street with an experimental cocktail bar, and a historic workshop can live alongside a concept store that opened last month.

It’s a neighborhood to live in more than one to sightsee. You can start the day with a coffee, browse independent shops and street markets, stop for an aperitivo, choose between Milanese cooking, food from around the world and contemporary restaurants, then carry the evening on between live music and bars.

There’s a particular energy in the air: Isola is lively, creative and full of movement, but it keeps a relaxed rhythm and a neighborhood feel that isn’t easy to find in Milan.

Where we’ve actually eaten, from breakfast to the last drink, is in where to eat in Isola. The places worth a detour are in what to see in Isola.

Why sleep in Isola

Staying in Isola means having a small Milan within reach.

For the evenings. You don’t have to cross the city every time you want to go out: restaurants, wine bars, cocktail bars and aperitivo spots are all packed within a few steps of one another. And being able to walk home after dinner, in Milan, is no small luxury.

For the location. Being close to Porta Garibaldi, to Milano Centrale and to the M2, M3 and M5 lines makes the neighborhood an excellent base for exploring the city. Add the trams, which are perfect for crossing Milan at that slow, faintly romantic pace that lets you look at it from a different angle.

For living Milan like a local. Isola isn’t just a convenient area to stay in: it’s a neighborhood with a definite personality, where you can feel the city changing without losing its link to its own history. Sleeping here means not merely seeing Milan, but experiencing one of its most contemporary sides.

If you want to add something to your trip beyond the classic Duomo–Brera–Navigli circuit, Isola is hard to beat: unvarnished, creative, full of life, with the most modern skyline in the city right around the corner.

The comparison between Milan’s neighborhoods, with average nightly prices, is in where to stay in Milan. The places to sleep inside the neighborhood itself, our loft included, are in where to stay in Isola.