So far out of the days we have experience today was my favorite. Starting with an amazing tour of the Starbucks in Milan that is absolutely breathtaking and finishing off with a tour of the Armani archive collect. Although Starbucks is not an Italian company or related to fashion it was a highly interesting visit and my favorite of all so far, due to the lengths Starbucks has gone to make the company acceptable for Italians with their high standards of coffee. Everything they undertook to integrate themselves into the environment of Milan was an amazing lesson in business tactics from the marble in the floor being from the Duomo to the wood being donated from local churches. It’s all one with the lifestyle in Italy and encompasses true Italian culture (spoiling all other Starbucks for me). At the Starbucks they have their exclusive lines of coffee and we got to taste them in a nicely roped off area making us feel very special about the visit. The coffee was absolutely delicious and for that reason can see how it has now become a staple in Italy too. In the shop the coffee is roasted and sent to holding silos through a vacuum pump system straight out of Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory.

Later in the day at the Armani collection we got to see the whole collect of garments going back to the 80’s. At the museum they had over 600 full outfits and 200+ accessories as well. The rooms of the museum were all dark to protect the clothes from light damage. It was a cool place and the clothing was all very interesting with how it tied to Armani himself as a person and showed his progression and history. Majority of the clothing in the place was womens with only a few mens wear items due to how much bigger the woman fashion industry in the world is. The tour was a tad long for my interest, but overall was an amazing experience and truly an art show. I just would have preferred more mens fashion items.