City guide · Italy · Europe
Formal gardens with fenced dog areas in the centre, a lake park on the city's eastern edge, and a design hotel that takes dogs.
6 places4 categories6 neighbourhoods4 with an off-leash area
6 places, each checked against the venue's own information
Neighbourhoods covered: Sempione and Castello, Municipio 1, Porta Venezia, Municipio 1, Municipio 5, southern Milan, Segrate, eastern edge of Milan, Porta Genova and Navigli, Via Tortona design district, Montenapoleone, Milan.
Parco Sempione is a 386,000 square metre English-style public garden in central Milan, laid out in 1893 between the Castello Sforzesco and the Arco della Pace. It has tree-lined avenues, a fenced lake with an iron bridge, lawns, and several museums and monuments in the heart of the city.
The Giardini Indro Montanelli are Milan's oldest public park, first laid out in 1794 near Porta Venezia and later redesigned as an English landscape with a lake, artificial rocks and a waterfall. The Natural History Museum and the Planetarium stand inside the gardens, a short walk from the shopping streets of Porta Venezia.
No photo yetGiardino Mario Capponi is a 29,900 square metre municipal garden in a quiet part of southern Milan, laid out in 1984 with a children's play area, a basketball court and rest areas along a central path. It holds several tree species, including a large common plane tree.
No photo yetThe Idroscalo is a large public park and lake about 8 kilometres from central Milan, built around an artificial basin used for rowing, sailing, canoeing and open-water events. It has extensive grass banks, a dedicated dog area, the national water-rescue dog school and a busy calendar of sports events.
No photo yetnhow Milano is a design hotel on Via Tortona in the city's Tortona design district, near the Navigli canals and facing the MUDEC museum. Its 246 individually decorated rooms occupy a converted industrial building with a rooftop pool, a restaurant, a lounge bar and changing art exhibitions.
No photo yetThe restaurant and café inside the House of Dior Milan, run by Enrico Bartolini, the world's most Michelin-starred Italian chef, serving refined Italian cuisine with breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea. Unusually for high fashion dining, small dogs are officially welcome — up to 10 kg — with an outdoor terrace as well.
Leash rules, off-leash hours and whether dogs are allowed inside are set locally and change without notice. Each listing here says what the venue or the responsible authority publishes, and the listing page links to the page we checked, so you can confirm the current rule before you set out. Outside a signed off-leash area, keep the dog on a lead.
No venue can pay to be listed or to rank higher, and no listing carries an invented rating or a stock photograph standing in for the real place. If something here is out of date, tell us and we will re-check it.
Heath and common land where off-lead walking is written into the rules, plus pubs with a dog wash in the garden.
A brasserie that says outright it welcomes dogs, dog cafes in the Marais, and one of the city's thirteen off-leash areas.
Beer gardens older than most countries, a forest where the lake is legally open to dogs, and the most dog-tolerant cafe culture in Europe.
Brown cafes with a dog under the table, a designated dog beach on the Gaasperplas, and a canal-house hotel that takes one small dog.
Terraces where a leashed dog is welcome by law, the city's one official dog beach, and a brewery hall with room to spare.
Third-wave coffee with a water bowl, the first dog park in the old city, and a rooftop with a view over the Tagus.
Send it in and we will check it against the venue's own information before it goes live. Venue owners can also send a photograph of their place — free, with the credit kept.
