Italians at the Fair

The Milan Fair was set up with a distinct commercial mission, as an ideal marketplace for business people to come together and close deals, taking major contracts home with them in their briefcases.

At the same time, the Milan Fair provided a stage for all to discover and witness the technological progress being made across all industry sectors. Thus the big marketplace was also a privileged viewpoint from which to observe a cross-section of Italian society and its transformation from the postwar era onwards, throughout the boom years of the Italian economic miracle.

At the Milan Fair, a glimpse could be caught of business people, journalists, specialists, and company personnel, but also, and above all, lots of ordinary people, in the crowds that swelled in the streets of the fairgrounds. Millions of Italians would flock to the fair for a quick and convenient look at progress, to admire a future that year after year offered something new and seemed to promise great things.