Tod’s Group Completes Restoration of Palazzo Marino in Milan

MILAN — No more scaffolding. After 18 months of work, Milan’s Palazzo Marino unveiled its face lift, courtesy of Tod’s Group. 

In 2023, the fashion company pledged 2.5 million euros to fund the restoration of the 16th-century building that stands in central Piazza della Scala here and has housed the city hall and local administration operations since 1861.

Tod’s Group chairman and chief executive officer Diego Della Valle expressed his satisfaction at a press conference for the outcome and the renovation, which was completed on budget and on time.

The Italian luxury group financed the revamp of all four external facades and those overlooking the internal courtyard, reworking over 80,730 square feet. The work started in 2024.

During the project, scaffolding reading “Tod’s for Milan” covered the building, featuring illustrations on the history of the palazzo until today — a sober visual intended to express how Della Valle’s initiative was a giveback move to the city and country with no commercial return.

“Being able to contribute to renovate the city hall was a tangible sign of how we feel towards the city, which is grateful,” he said, defining Milan as “the city that, from an entrepreneurial point of view, represents our second home.” The executive also stressed the importance of “seeing how fast we managed to do everything: this happens when there’s a real common interest, with no speculations around it… This is an example of how public institutions and private companies can work.”

Della Valle exhorted fellow entrepreneurs to follow the same path and get involved in similar projects “without asking anything in return,” in moves that he believes could further strengthen Italy’s overall attractiveness and global appeal.

“Let’s consider what we can do, and I’m not talking about only in arts,” he said, pointing to efforts to help students in Milan with the cost of living as another example.  

“Today, with the current economic situation and everything going on in the world, we, as entrepreneurs, have the obligation to focus also on things outside of our core business. We need to be good entrepreneurs, making money with companies and helping them operate, but we also need to take a step further, which is to monitor the local communities and territory and ensure that everything that’s needed is done by us,” he said. “This means being very fast, directly controlling what we do and achieving results that can change people’s lives very quickly… We need to act fast, because there isn’t much time, poverty is growing and we can’t just stand by and [be indifferent].”

Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala also wished that “this little, big project” might be replicated.

“We’re here today not just to explain what has been done, but to encourage others to follow Tod’s lead,” said Sala. “In this project there were at least three virtuous aspects,” he said, citing Tod’s sober and non-invasive sponsoring campaign; the fast turnaround of the renovation and the synergy between public and private parties, which is “an indisputable quality of Milan.”

He said it was such a trait that propelled talks with the administration in Italy’s Piedmont and Liguria regions to put them forward with Lombardy as hosts for the 2036 or 2040 Summer Olympics.

Palazzo Marino’s renovation also saw the involvement of Dontstop Architettura, the Andrea Borri Architetti studio and architect Paolo Pecorelli, whose firm has restored the facade of the storied luxury Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II in the city, among other projects.

Originally designed by Galeazzo Alessi, Palazzo Marino attracts around 5,000 visitors a year and hadn’t been restored since the end of the ‘80s. 

The building stands opposite the landmark Teatro alla Scala. Della Valle has a well-established relationship with the theater as well, since Tod’s is a founding member of the Teatro alla Scala Foundation and in 2010 agreed to contribute to support the theater’s productions for a year and help promote its values globally via a short promotional film called “An Italian Dream.”

At the time, the project closely followed the announcement that Della Valle offered to finance the work needed to restore the Colosseum in Rome through a of 25 million euros. This remains Della Valle’s most public effort to support the country with a commitment that has lasted for more than a decade. 

Other initiatives of the group through the years include the support of Milan’s contemporary art museum PAC as well as its contribution to FAI, The National Trust for Italy, in its restoration of the hill that inspired the poem “The Infinite” by Giacomo Leopardi in the early 1800s. In addition, it has implemented several social initiatives, including the education of children in need in the Barra district in Naples; support of Save the Children in its “Punti Luce” project, and a collaboration with the Patrignano community. The group also built a shoe manufacturing plant in Italy’s Arquata del Tronto in 2017, a town hit by a deadly earthquake a year earlier.