Named after the well-preserved Neoclassic gate built in 1810 on this site, it is now one of Italy's most high-tech and international districts, containing the country's tallest skyscraper: the Unicredit Tower.

Geographical Porta Nuova was the main engine of the global invention of "polypropylene" by Giulio Natta, or in other terms, plastic, popularized by several companies within the city during the 1950s.

[1] In the 1990s Milan, a former heavy-industry powerhouse, was filled with about 6 million square metres of industrial wastelands and unused railroad tracks; transforming such places following the example set by London and other post-industrial cities had become a primary objective for the municipal administration.

[10] The "Varesine" area, named after a now demolished railway station that once connected Milan to Varese, has been designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox Associated and occupies 85,000 square metres.

[12] The "Isola" area ("island" in Italian, owing its name to the fact that it was once encircled by railway lines[13]), designed by Boeri Studio, extends over 31,500 square metres.