Before he built Milan’s Central Station, Ulisse Stacchini designed this small Viennese house for an industrialist who wanted three of them.
At a glance
Casa Donzelli stands at Via Revere 7, in the quiet grid of streets behind Corso Magenta. It was built to a design by Ulisse Stacchini — the regional heritage record dates the work 1909, the national heritage catalogue 1907 — the architect who would later build Milan’s monumental Central Station — and the regional heritage record calls it a thoroughly successful Milanese version of a typical Viennese Secession house.
History
The house is one of three small apartment buildings commissioned in the first years of the twentieth century by the industrialist Beniamino Donzelli (1863–1952); the other two stand in Via Tasso and Via Gioberti. Building three houses to the same purpose, in the same quarter and within a few years, was a way of investing industrial money in property while advertising a taste for the newest architecture.
What you see
Geometric and floral motifs alternate across the front. Small balconies carry wrought-iron balustrades by the master smith Alessandro Mazzucotelli, and the entrance door is decorated with stylised geometric patterns. The facade closes with a cornice bounded by a parapet, at whose outer ends double windows are set with anthropomorphic decoration. The heritage record singles out the interior fittings — the inner doors and, again, the ironwork — as the most valuable elements of all.
Cultural significance
The house documents the Viennese, rather than the Franco-Belgian, current of Milanese Liberty: straighter, more geometric, less floral. It also catches Stacchini early, fifteen years before the station that made his name, and shows how far his language would travel.
Key facts
- Architect: Ulisse Stacchini
- Built: 1909 (regional heritage record); 1907 in the national heritage catalogue
- Wrought iron: Alessandro Mazzucotelli
- Patron: Beniamino Donzelli (1863–1952), industrialist
- Style: Milanese Liberty in the Viennese Secession manner
- Address: Via Revere 7, Milan
- Coordinates: 45.4719 N, 9.1694 E
Practical information & getting there
Metro M1 Conciliazione or M2 Sant’Ambrogio, ten minutes on foot. It is a private apartment building: the facade is the visit. Casa Laugier, Villino Maria Luisa and Casa Dugnani are all within a fifteen-minute walk, which makes this the natural start of a Liberty circuit through Porta Magenta.
Sources & resources
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