Galleria Vittorio Emanuele happens to be the oldest active shopping gallery and also a huge landmark in the magnificent city of Milan. It is housed within a four-story double arcade which is also in the centre of town. They call it the heart of the city. The Galleria is named after Victor Emanuele, who happened to be the first king of the kingdom of Italy. It was designed in the year 1861 and was built between 1865 and 1877. Construction finished by the 1870s. If you actually go ahead and look at a map of Milan, you will see that this place is literally located in the centre of the entire city. The architecture of this place is absolutely astounding and spectacular. The structure consists of two glass vaulted arcades intersecting in an octagon covering the street connecting Piazza del Duomo to Piazza Della Scala.
The street is actually covered by an arching glass and cast-iron roof, and it happens to be a very popular design for the 19th century. There is another arcade called the Burlington Arcade in London, which was actually a prototype for larger glazed shopping arcades. The one in London is actually very beautiful. I actually admire the floor in Galleria Vittorio Emanuele. It is actually very well maintained, and the glass roof of this place was actually restored after the second world war. The central octagonal space is actually topped with this glass dome. The Milanese Galleria was larger in scale than the predecessors, and it was definitely an important step in the evolution of the modern glazed and enclosed shopping mall.
On the ground of the central octagonal, there are actually four mosaics portraying the court of arms of all of the three capitals of the kingdom of Italy, which happened to be Florence, Rome and Turin. The tradition actually says that if a person spins around three times with a heel on the bull, it will actually bring them good luck. This practice has actually caused a lot of damage near the pool. The gallery connects two of Milan’s most famous landmarks, like I mentioned above. But this particular Galleria is a landmark in its own right. Millions of people have visited this place.
The Milan gallery and the roof have actually been acknowledged as a very important reference on the 19-century iron and glass architecture. As many people can still observe to the day, the roof actually consists of four-barrel vaults, which are 14.5 m in weights and 8.5 m in height, and they are crowned with a huge dome which is around 37.5 m as internal diameter and 17.10 m in height.