LUME LAUNCHES AL FRESCO AREA – ORTO DI LUME
Michelin-starred LUME (Milan, Italy) introduces the next stage of its development, providing guests with an alternative and harmonised gourmet experience
Michelin-starred restaurant LUME, Milan (Italy), announces the opening of its al fresco area – Orto di LUME – after an extremely successful first year.
Since opening in June 2016, with Executive Chef Luigi Taglienti, the restaurant was awarded its first Michelin star just 6 months later, and more recently was announced as the Best New European Restaurant at the prestigious OAD Awards, held in Paris in May.
“We are excited for the next stage of the restaurant’s development” said Marco Bruzzi, Managing Director at LUME. “It was always a part of our plan for the restaurant.
The Orto di LUME has been completed on time and ahead of schedule, with no interruption to the day-to-day service.”
Key features The restaurant’s new outdoor area is a mesmerising spectacle – a calming white, grey, and green oasis away from the busy streets of Milan’s Navigli district, in which LUME is situated.
Within the rectangular 160 sqm outdoor area, the focal point is a large 60 sqm birdcage, in which guests are seated. Here they can order from the same menus offered inside, but also benefit from a “5 sense experience”. Surrounded by the plants that bear the fruits of many of the dishes’ core ingredients, such as lemon, basil, rosemary and many more, guests gain a further insight into Executive Chef Taglienti’s simple and seasonal approach to cooking, and are able to recognise the innovative techniques used in LUME’s kitchen to transform these
ingredients into dishes that surprise and delight.
The al fresco area adds an additional 16 covers to the restaurant’s current 40. There are four circular tables, with the capacity to seat up to 4 people per table. The area will be open from today until weather permits in 2017, and will open again in Spring 2018.
The philosophy – an extension of the LUME experience
In everything that makes up the LUME experience – the design, the food, the service and the W37 building in which it sits – the dualistic themes of heritage and evolution are present.
The new al fresco area gives guests the opportunity to experience what LUME is about in an alternative environment. Indeed, just as Executive Chef Luigi Taglienti’s food honours the importance of history and tradition, while at the same time offering something totally new, the design of LUME both indoors and outdoors and the features that form part of the restaurant’s aesthetics recall the memory of the past but are, at the same time, forward-looking.
The use of the oversized 19th Century bird cage, the Art Nouveau style decorations on the walls and the square stone pavement in the garden are all elements from our past. However, all these decorations have been adapted with a modern, futuristic twist. For example, the birdcage, vastly out of proportion compared to the space in which it sits, is used as a container, and an apple tree, a historic symbol of the fruits that the past can bear, is an espaliered apple tree that grows as a beautiful work of art against the wall.
Commenting on what inspired her design of the Orto di LUME, Architect Monical Melotti said: “At LUME, our goal is to give guests a truly memorable experience, but we also want to
encourage them to remember the vital role of memory in both our present and our future.
I wanted to transport those dining in the Orto back in time, into a traditional Italian grandmother’s backyard in an outlying metropolitan district. Many of the features that I have chosen to place here are reminiscent of exactly this, but have been reinterpreted; such as the painted white terracotta pots, a garden with edible plants instead of flowers and the 19th Century birdcage.”
LUME opened its doors in Milan (Italy) in June 2016 and was awarded with a Michelin star in November that year. The restaurant’s owner Emanuela Verlicchi Marazzi, LUME’s architect Monica Melotti and managing director Marco Bruzzi alongside highly-talented executive chef Luigi Taglienti have designed a holistic dining experience. The restaurant offers an
enchanting setting, in which the unique architecture and design complements and enhances an exceptional culinary experience.
The restaurant is situated within the W37 complex – a former porcelain factory from Richard Ginori that was purchased by MB America in 2014. Thanks to an extensive restoration and
regeneration project led by Marco Bruzzi and Monica Melotti’s MB America, the building was then converted into a commercial and residential complex, comprised of apartments, offices and event spaces as well as LUME. W37’s structure and design has been inspired by Monica Melotti’s’ passion both for authentically Italian concepts but also from her experiences around the world. Her aim and vision for the building was to ensure that a balance of both historical heritage and contemporary design is maintained throughout W37.
The restaurant was christened LUME after the warm white hues that dominate the setting.
Just as modernity represents several interrelated histories, at the core of LUME’s philosophy is the recognition that memories are actualized to make up the present. The whiteness reflects
the light and brightens up the room. It celebrates and enhances the past; the traditions; the histories and the experiences that are the DNA behind the restaurant’s creativity – both in terms of the food and the space.
The kitchen resembles a glass box with an embroidered exterior, designed by Monica Melotti and made by a local Italian artisan. This intricate feature separates the kitchen from the dining area which accommodates 40 guests. The kitchen located in the middle of the venue, is, according to the architect, the firefly of the restaurant. During night service the kitchen plays a leading role; strongly lit in contrast with the dining room’s low and diffused lighting.
Like the design of the restaurant, Luigi’s cuisine is innovative but classic and attached to the concept of memory. Ever conscious of streamlining the cooking with the restaurant’s setting, Luigi has created a series of menus that offer a combination of classic and contemporary cooking, in harmony with the intricate yet visionary design scheme of LUME.
LUME opened its doors in Milan (Italy) in June 2016 and, with its executive chef Luigi Taglienti, it was awarded a Michelin star in November that year. In May 2017, the restaurant was voted the Best New European Restaurant at the Opinionated About Dining (OAD) Awards in Paris. The restaurant’s owner Emanuela Verlicchi Marazzi, LUME’s architect Monica Melotti and managing director Marco Bruzzi alongside highly-talented executive chef Luigi Taglienti have designed a holistic dining experience. The menus offer a combination of classic and contemporary cooking, in harmony with the intricate yet visionary design scheme of the restaurant.
Within the elaborate lace-like box structure in the centre of the restaurant sits the kitchen, in which an energetic culinary instinct governs. Luigi’s creations are both modern and outward-looking but, simultaneously, deeply-rooted in the heritage of Italian cuisine, something which he believes should never be forgotten. One of LUME’s two tasting menus includes dishes linked to Milanese gastronomic culture – Taglienti style “Ossobuco”; braised veal muzzle in spumante wine, mustard salad, cucumber and black truffle and veal in “Milanese” style, salt-baked Jerusalem artichokes with seafood salad and black truffle and tiramisu.
LUIGI’S PHILOSOPHY
As well as celebrating the history of the Italian cuisine – driven by the chef’s intrinsic understanding of (and near obsession with) the history of his native country’s cooking – Luigi
is also devoted to his own past and experiences. The current creativity in Luigi’s kitchen and his revolutionary style of cooking is guided by his instinct as much as by his own personal and professional background both in Italy and abroad. In addition to his time spent working with both Ezio Santin and Carlo Cracco, for example, Luigi also spent time cooking in the kitchen of French Chef Christian Willer, at the world-famous longstanding restaurant La Palme d’Or in Cannes.
One particular dish that exemplifies the way in which Luigi’s experience informs his cooking today features on the new a la carte menu: bresse chicken with seaweed, stuffed morel
mushrooms, chervil spider crab and albufera sauce. In this dish, the bresse chicken takes heed from Luigi’s experience in Cannes. The crab is a product of his childhood in Liguria and,
representative of Italian cuisine in general, morchella mushroom is stuffed with chicken liver paté. Finally, a light version of an Albufera sauce, a classic French sauce of simple ingredients but enriched with truffle, forms a channel which links all the ingredients back together.
The crucial role that the albufera sauce plays in the dish embodies a vital component of Luigi’s deeply-rooted philosophy. Throughout his menus, the sauces act as protagonists, connecting all the ingredients and enhancing them, but also as a vehicle for expression of both technique
and sophistication. With every sauce, Luigi brings forward the traditional sensations found in the classic recipes and adds to them with a contemporary mark, invigorating them with acidic
tones or by using complex means of flavor extraction through the use of low-temperatures.
DESIGN
The restaurant was christened LUME after the warm white hues that dominate the setting.
Just as modernity represents several interrelated histories, at the core of LUME’s philosophy is the recognition that memories are actualized to make up the present. The whiteness reflects
the light and brightens up the room. It celebrates and enhances the past; the traditions; the histories and the experiences that are the DNA behind the restaurant’s creativity – both in terms of the food and the space.
BACKGROUND TO THE W37 COMPLEX
LUME is situated within the W37 complex – a former porcelain factory from Richard Ginori that was purchased by MB America in 2014. Thanks to an extensive restoration and regeneration project led by Marco Bruzzi and Monica Melotti’s MB America, the building was then converted into a commercial and residential complex, comprised of apartments, offices and event spaces as well as LUME. The building’s structure and design has been inspired by the architect’s passion both for authentically Italian concepts but also from her experiences around the world.
Having recognized Luigi as a rising culinary star in 2013, Emanuela Verlicchi Marazzi conceived the idea of LUME. The entrepreneur and President of the Filippo Marazzi Foundation has always invested in initiatives supporting young talent. Together, Emanuela Verlicchi Marazzi, Monica Melotti and Marco Bruzzi imagined a holistic vision for W37. From the renovation and requalification of the building; to the business and operations; to the brand development, at the centre of everything is a commitment to ensuring that a balance of both historical
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Via G. Watt 37, 20143 Milano
t: +39 0280888624
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Dinner from 19.30 to 22.00
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