Those wholive in Milan know exactly what this is all about. Who has never walked past it or gone specifically to peek through the grates of the gate at this beautiful villa in the center of Milan, in Palestro.

How many things, how much history can be hidden behind a gate, a doorway, a courtyard, and how many things there are to see and visit in a city like Milan capable of astonishing and marveling from every point of view.
Villa Invernizzi, for us Milanese, is often a memory linked to childhood. We used to go there to see the flamingos bathing in the fountain.

Even today, flamingos stroll beyond the gate of Villa Invernizzi. Passersby stop to admire them and take a picture as they sink their beaks into the pink feathers. They have lived on Corso Venezia since 1970 , thanks to Cavalier Invernizzi, a lover of these animals who had them imported from Chile and Africa, and they have adapted perfectly and do not seem intent on flying away.
The flamingos, all born in captivity, are of as many as two different species: the pink flamingo and Chilean flamingo. Some of them are more than 25 years old and over time, thanks to the ideal conditions they found in the villa, their numbers have grown.

Villa Invernizzi nowadays is home to the Invernizzi Foundation, and the flamingos are the only undisturbed full-time inhabitants of the villa, which is privately owned by the Invernizzi Foundation, administrator of the family's assets and companies and obliged by will by the knight, who died without heirs, to protect and care for his beloved animals.

The villa is not open to the public and cannot be visited, but as you pass by you can see the flamingos and the Villa's garden.
If you are passing through the center...look out on Via Dei Cappuccini in front of the grates of Villa Invernizzi to see the flamingos.

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(Ph Ig: @mahmarcello)