Tomorrow, Friday, May 9, sees the opening of the new Rizzoli Milano, an iconic bookstore originally opened in 1949, which over the years has welcomed generations of passionate readers, writers and leading figures from the publishing world, to become a symbol of the city and the country’s cultural history.

After an important renovation project that has enhanced its identity, the bookshop in its historic location in Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II now provides new spaces and a restyled offering with a full calendar of events and an even stronger international vocation.

«Rizzoli Milano is much more than a bookshop. It’s a unique space of its kind designed to encourage people to meet and chat, capable of engaging a wide audience of book lovers. In one of the city’s most famous locations, it combines the appeal of a “historic store” with a dynamic contemporary cultural offer, to give the public a window on the world,» said Carmine Perna, CEO of Mondadori Retail. «The project is also the symbol of a deep bond with the city of Milan – which has been renewed every day for more than 75 years – thanks to our collaboration with the City Council, demonstrating that reading and culture are a fundamental part of Milanese life and one of its greatest assets,» Perna added.

The Rizzoli Milano renovation project is a strategic step in the development plan of Mondadori Retail, the Mondadori Group company that manages the largest network of bookshops in Italy, with over 500 stores across the country: around 30 new stores will open in 2025, including directly managed and franchised outlets.

The plan confirms the constant commitment of the Mondadori Group – Italy’s leading publisher – to boosting the value of bookstores as key locations to promote reading, meetings and cultural dialogue.

THE PRESENTATION
The day opened with an introduction from Mondadori Group CEO Antonio Porro and an institutional welcome from Emmanuel Conte, Milan City Councillor for the Budget, State Property and the Special Housing Plan.

The presentation of the new Rizzoli Milano continued with a discussion entitled “Rizzoli Milano, a historical bookshop for contemporary audiences. A meeting place for culture, events and an international outlook”, with Mondadori Retail CEO Carmine Perna, Président-Directrice générale Éditions JC Lattès Véronique Cardi, Paola Dubini, Professor of Management at the Bocconi University, and journalist and writer Beppe Severgnini.

The debate – moderated by Alessandra Tedesco – examined the role of bookshops as cultural venues in urban and international communities, and explored the ability of a location like Rizzoli Milano to combine its identity as a historic store with a cosmopolitan vocation. 

In interviews conducted by Mondadori Retail among a selection of loyal Italian customers to investigate perception of the cultural role of bookshops in general and of Rizzoli Milano in particular, the store’s symbolic value and identity clearly emerged:

• 70% recognise it as a historic bookstore;
• 57% consider it a symbol of Milan;
• 31% value its international profile.

Rizzoli Milano attracts readers of all ages and geographical backgrounds – from the citizens of Milan to international visitors, the latter accounting for about 40% of the bookshop’s customers – as well as young people, who are turning to original-language books in increasing numbers.

On this point, Paola Dubini, Professor of Management at the Bocconi University, observed: «Milan is an international city not only because it attracts tourists from all over the world, but because many international communities live here. It is important to have a cultural venue to welcome the “historic” residents of Milan, their cosmopolitan children, and people from around the world who have decided to make Milan their home, as well as people coming through the gallery. This is the distinguishing feature of the Rizzoli bookstore that makes it feel particularly welcoming,» concluded Dubini.

The event was also an opportunity to take an in-depth look at trends in reading habits and use of bookshops in other European contexts, with a special focus on France. In her contribution, Véronique Cardi, Président-Directrice générale Éditions JC Lattès, offered an overview of the French publishing market, highlighting similarities and differences in the link between readers and bookstores.

«I am delighted and honoured to have been invited to the reopening of the historic Rizzoli bookshop in Milan, to reaffirm the central role bookstores have played and will continue to play in Italy as they do in France,» said Véronique Cardi.

A different angle was taken by Beppe Severgnini, journalist and long-time Rizzoli author, who shared reflections and anecdotes illustrating his point of view as a writer, reader and visitor to Italian and international bookshops. In his fascinating remarks, Severgnini highlighted the cultural and symbolic role of bookshops as places for encounters, discoveries and memories.

«I have been a Rizzoli author since I had black hair, starting with ‘Inglesi’ in 1990. More than twenty titles have followed, with the latest, ‘Socrates, Agata e il futuro’, published in 2025. Over these thirty-five years I have come to realise that a bookshop, like a publishing house, is an imagined community. Like a country, a football team, an association. Sometimes publishers and authors get distracted and forget this. Readers don’t. Readers sense that behind a publisher there is a story, a personality, a project, a flavour,» said Severgnini.

THE OFFER OF THE NEW BOOKSTORE
Completely redesigned in terms of space and services, the new Rizzoli Milano meets the needs of a contemporary multigenerational and international audience.

The bookstore occupies two floors, on a total area of 755 square metres, with four large windows overlooking Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II.
Its shelves are organised into numerous thematic sections that accompany visitors on an exciting journey through books and architecture.

On the ground floor, visitors are welcomed into a comfortable and innovative space for all book lovers. After a large area with the latest publications, novels and best sellers, they come to a new department with accessories, guides and gift items inspired by the city of Milan.

Continuing on, the visitor can immerse himself in the famous Rizzoli Ottagono room, where a carefully curated selection of books, a rich catalogue of original-language titles, is available: the room is furnished with cherrywood tables, a homage to the cinematic imagery of the Rizzoli bookstore in New York, with designer lamps from the historic heritage of the Rizzoli Milano store.

On the way to the lower floor, the visitor will enjoy an area for all lovers of stationery, pens and gift items and the scenic staircase winding around the bookstore’s panoramic lift.

On the lower floor, visitors are greeted by a large R surrounded by a wall of books dedicated to the thematic areas of the store, a sort of Ariadne’s thread.
This floor houses the new events room – for presentations, meetings with authors and talks with the public – overlooking a large wall of illustrated books on art, design and photography, leisure, travel, tourism and design pieces celebrating the uniqueness of Milan, selected from the archives of leading Italian manufacturers.

The lower floor is also home to the fiction department and a new non-fiction area – with a new arrangement of tables and spaces for reading and research – enhanced by the bookstore’s historic octagonal skylights over the Galleria concourse.
Meanwhile, the “We Are Junior” play and entertainment area gives children and small readers the opportunity to discover the world of books in a stimulating environment made to measure for them. The new area is separated from the rest of the bookshop by the distinctive yellows of the format designed for small children, and offers a curated selection of illustrated books, first readers, educational games and entertainment, making the store a welcoming place for families.
The lower floor’s offer is completed by the section for Kobo e-readers, with accessories and gift cards.

For an increasingly people-oriented shopping experience, the bookshop is enhanced with a series of services, including a new multi-purpose reading room that reinforces its identity as a place to meet and talk.
In addition, both floors are equipped with Trovalibro touchscreens – in Italian and English – that help readers explore the products and find out where the book they are looking for is located, automated checkouts to simplify the shopping experience, and a Click & Collect service, which lets customers make online purchases on the bookstore’s website and pick them up in the shop.

THE ARCHITECTURAL PROJECT
The architectural redevelopment project for the new Rizzoli Milano – designed by the Paolo Lucchetta Retail Design studio, with Virginia Lucchetta and Gianluca Trovó – focused on preserving the bookstore’s historical identity, while enhancing its contemporary vocation.

In addition to the new organisation of the space and the use of American cherrywood for the furnishings, distinctive elements – such as the iconic brass handles in the shape of an “R”’, the ink-blue floors, the cast-iron pillars, the octagonal skylights and the original vaulted ceilings designed by Giuseppe Mengoni for the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II – have been preserved and restored.

Innovative architectural solutions have been introduced to make the spaces more expressive and functional, starting with the windows, which showcase the books in the store. The lighting has also been restyled, thanks to a careful relamping project creating theatrical yet more sustainable effects.
All the furnishings have been redesigned to stimulate curiosity and the pleasure of choosing a book, fostering a more personal and interactive relationship with the publications and products through the store graphics and visual communication.

EVENTS
An exciting calendar of events, presentations and meetings has been planned for the Rizzoli Milano bookstore, starting just a few days after the opening. Below are the first unmissable events with major authors and personalities from the world of literature and culture.

• 13 May at 6.30 p.m., Antonino Di Pietro will present his latest book Cambia pelle (Sperling & Kupfer) in a chat with Michela Proietti
• 14 May from 6.00 pm., Andrea Giuliodori with La svolta (Rizzoli)
• 19 May, Rula Jebreal with Quello che rimane di noi nell’era neo-imperiale (Piemme)
• 20 May, Maurizio De Giovanni with Il pappagallo muto (Rizzoli)
• 21 May, Chiara Francini with Le querce non fanno limoni (Rizzoli)
• 22 May, Walter Veltroni with Iris, La libertà (Rizzoli)
• 23 May, Nicoletta Romanoff with Come il tralcio alla vite (Rizzoli)
• 27 May, Valeria Locati with La distanza che cura (Mondadori)
• 28 May, Roberta Recchia with Io che ti ho voluto così bene (Rizzoli)
• 29 May, Enzo Amendola with L’imam deve morire (Mondadori)
• 3 June, Cristina Cassar Scalia with Delitto di benvenuto (Einaudi)
• 4 June, Annalisa Cuzzocrea with E non scappare mai (Rizzoli)
• 11 June, Fabio Ciconte with Il cibo è politica (Einaudi)
• 16 June, Marino Bartoletti and Maria Vittoria Backhaus with Come together (Rizzoli)
• 19 June, Andrea Staid with Dare forme al mondo (UTET).

For more details, go to the website: www.eventi.mondadoristore.it

Partners
The partners of the new Rizzoli Milano are: Paolo Lucchetta Retail Design for the architectural design and layout of the bookshop; Altavia for the communication concept of the event; Campus Fandango Club for the organisation of the opening event; Radio Montecarlo, the official in-store radio station.

Photo credit: Vito Corvasce

Mondadori Store is the largest network of bookstores in Italy: a cultural organisation active nationwide with more than 500 stores in large cities and small towns alike, and online through the Mondadoristore.it e-commerce website and the book club formula.
The bookstores are designed as places where local communities can meet and learn and future readers can develop a love of books. In addition to books – the heart of the offer – there are also specific formats and products for younger generations, such as “Just Comics” (dedicated to the world of comics and illustrated volumes, from manga and graphic novels to superheroes and major Italian authors) and “We are junior”, an area designed to welcome younger readers, with books and learning games that stimulate the imagination.
Mondadori Store also offers readers and users entertainment experiences, events and multi-channel services. The special attention placed on organising meetings with writers, singers and artists from the performing arts, workshops and activities for children (also available online) has made it possible to increase points of contact and opportunities to engage customers in the community. As a result, Mondadori Bookstores are an important landmark for culture and entertainment, whose responsiveness to customer needs and innovative proposals make the difference.
The Mondadori Group network is active through four sales channels: direct sales, franchising, web and bookclub. 

Our publishing house Rizzoli won the ninth edition of the Premio Strega Ragazze e Ragazzi 2024 in the 8+ category with the book “Rim and the Liberated Words” by Maddalena Vaglio Tanet.

With a story that makes us dream and reflect, the author reminds us that words are the key to freedom and awareness. “Rim and the Liberated Words” is among the top-rated books by very young readers representing the 318 schools that make up the jury.

The awards were presented this afternoon as part of “Più Libri Più Liberi,” the Fair of Small and Medium Publishers, in the Auditorium of La Nuvola, in the presence of about 1,000 primary and secondary school students from all over Italy and abroad.

The jury’s motivation: “Young Rim loves to collect words but lives in a country where words are captive and not available to everyone. There are not even schools. Words are therefore a privilege of the few and therefore not everyone can say what they think. Without words, in fact, there is no freedom of thought. Old Witzold will help Rim, through magical, fantastical and fairy-tale-like events, to recover ancient truths and, above all, to free the caged words. A compelling metaphor, as relevant as ever, for power and its abuse, the importance of language, and the utmost attention we must all pay to the free use of words and their knowledge, beginning in childhood years.”

As of September 1, 2023 Federica Magro will assume the position of Editorial Director of Rizzoli, responding directly to Massimo Turchetta, General Manager and Publisher of the publishing house.

«I am grateful for the trust of those who appointed me to this position in the senior management of the Mondadori Group, and to Massimo Turchetta in particular. I consider myself fortunate because I know that I will be working with a team of professionals whom I hold in high esteem. Rizzoli is a great publishing house with a strong tradition of confronting the key issues of its time. We publish books in every sphere of publishing – from fiction to non-fiction, from classics to graphic novels – and have never been afraid to give space to the ideas and experiences of different worlds, faiths, and political orientations. We think we can gain new readers only if we maintain an open-minded approach to the complexities and contradictions of the present. This is my ambition: to keep Rizzoli at the centre of the debate, offering readers the tools and stories they need to interpret our times.»

Originally from Friuli, 54 years old, with two daughters, after graduating in Literature from the University of Milan and earning a doctorate from La Sapienza in Rome in Romance Philology, Federica Magro began working in the world of books, as a translator and reader for publishing houses, literary agencies, and newspapers, an activity with which she combined university research until 2001, when she joined the Mondadori Group as digital content manager for Mondadori Retail.

In 2006, she was called to work at the Oscars.

She joined the RCS Group in 2012 as editorial manager of BUR, where she combined management of a catalogue of over 4000 titles with creation of new original paperback series and scouting of non-fiction authors (including Daniele Novara and Stefania Andreoli, among others).

In 2016, she added to her frontlist responsibilities with BUR: historical novels for Fabbri and YA fiction for Rizzoli, the latter a veritable hotbed of new and established authors (such as Christopher Paolini, John Green, and Stephanie Garber, recently joined by British writer Holly Jackson, with her “Good Girls” trilogy on the charts for over a year).

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The publishing houses of the Mondadori Group are launching the Millennial Editor project for talented under 30s who dream of becoming  book editors.
An innovative and unprecedented programme, aimed at graduates in the humanities and economics, through which the Mondadori Group offers millennials with a consuming passion for books and reading a unique opportunity to enter the publishing world.

Einaudi, Electa, Mondadori, Piemme, Rizzoli, Sperling & Kupfer, Mondadori Education and Rizzoli Education, through a selection process in various stages, will identify eight young talents who will be guaranteed a period of two years of work and training as an editor with an apprenticeship contract.

The candidates selected will pursue a path during which they will be required to measure themselves against the activities of the various publishing areas and participate in training sessions with highly experienced professionals of the Group’s various publishing houses.
An all-round opportunity to learn the profession of editor, not only the specific aspects of publishing, but also the institutional, technical and managerial sides, interacting and collaborating with all of the protagonists involved in the book chain, starting from authors and senior editors. Each participant will develop the key skills necessary to face the challenges of a continuously evolving market.

The Millennial Editor project is developed in collaboration with Monster Italia, a highly specialised company in personnel research, and the technical partner in the recruitment phase.
You can submit your application from today, to this link.
After an initial selection based on qualifications and experience, in the second half of March suitable candidates will take part in an Edithon, a one-day event at Palazzo Mondadori during which they will meet the leading figures involved in the  project and, after being divided into work groups, will have the opportunity to put themselves to the test.
By the end of April, the eight young talents selected will be allocated, according to their characteristics and inclinations, to one of the areas, i.e. non-fiction, miscellaneous, fiction or educational of the publishing houses involved: Einaudi, Electa, Mondadori, Piemme, Rizzoli, Sperling & Kupfer, Mondadori Education and Rizzoli Education.

On February 13, Rizzoli publishes “Fire and Fury”, the publishing phenomenon of this beginning of the year.

The book, which was released in the USA on January 5 and initially sold in 150,000 copies, has already reached 1.1 million paper copies sold out – with readers queuing up at night in front of bookshops as in Harry Potter’s day – as well as hundreds of thousands of copies in ebooks and the audio version.

In England, in just a few days and even before its arrival in the bookshop on January 10, the print run reached 400,000 copies and there are already more than 20 countries that have acquired publishing rights. In France the volume, as announced today by Le Figaro, will be released on February 22nd for Laffont.

Lies? It’s all true,”says Wolff, who initially imagined the book as an account of the first 100 days at the White House to be published one year after the beginning of Trump’s presidency and then, unexpectedly, had access to the President and most senior members of his staff, including Steve Bannon, for a total of 18 months (the first interview took place in May 2016), becoming a” constant intruder “.

Michael Wolff, 64, an American author, essayist, and journalist, and a regular columnist and contributor to USA Today, The Hollywood Reporter, and the UK edition of GQ, has already stirred up a sensation with a biography on Rupert Murdoch (2007, The Man Who Owns the News).

Our publishing houses are at the 69th Frankfurt Book Fair , scheduled from 11 to 15 October.

This is the most important European event and among the most prestigious in the world.

Mondadori, Rizzoli, Einaudi, Sperling & Kupfer and Piemme are in Hall 5.0, Stand C56.

Today sees the launch, within the Trade Books Area of the Mondadori Group, managed by Enrico Selva Coddè, of the Children’s Books Business Unit, which includes the publishing houses Mondadori, Rizzoli, Fabbri and Piemme with the Battello a Vapore and Geronimo Stilton brands.
The aim of the new structure is to consolidate, as well as further expand, the company’s leadership in children’s publishing.

The Children’s Books Business Unit, which will be headed up by Lorenzo Garavaldi, aims to enhance the various imprints in response to the challenges of a strategic and continuously changing market.

The new organisational structure, while maintaining the different positioning and characteristics of the individual publishing houses, will facilitate a more complete and coherent articulation of the offer. The skills, creativity and passion of the people of the publishing houses will guarantee the essential quality and innovation necessary to reach excellent results

The Editorial Director of the new Children’s Books Business Unit will be Enrico Racca and the heads of the various publishing houses – Patrizia Puricelli for Piemme Geronimo Stilton, Alessandro Gelso for Rizzoli and Fabbri Ragazzi, Marta Mazza for Mondadori Ragazzi and Enrico Racca (ad interim) for Piemme Battello a Vapore – will report directly to him.
Lorenzo Garavaldi will remain in charge of marketing.
Rights for the whole area will be managed by Laura Casonato, who is already in charge of rights for Edizioni Piemme and Sperling & Kupfer.
Press and Communications for the Children’s Books Business Unit will be overseen by Paola Caviggioli, who remains as head of Communications for Edizioni Piemme and Sperling & Kupfer.

Rizzoli Hires Eccles Fisher Associates

With effect from August 1st, Rizzoli, BUR and Fabbri Editori in Italy have appointed Eccles Fisher Associates as their UK scout

Founded in 1983, Eccles Fisher Associates Ltd is a literary scouting agency working on behalf of publishers from eighteen countries and a film and T.V. company

www.ecclesfisher.com

With 143 votes, La scuola cattolica (The Catholic School) by Edward Albinati (Rizzoli) has won the seventieth edition of the Premio Strega.
La scuola cattolica is a monumental work of one thousand-three hundred pages in which Albinati recounts the 1970s, starting from the years spent at a private school in the Trieste district of Rome, also attended by the authors of the notorious “Delitto del Circeo”, a widely covered crime committed in 1975 that shocked the whole country, that serves as a means to explore the world as a whole, focusing on key issues such as Catholic education, the Italian bourgeoisie, the relationship between males and females, the institution of the family, adolescence, sex, violence; money, friendship, revenge. Mixing real people with fictional characters, legendary teachers, priests, thugs, little geniuses and psychopaths, enigmatic young girls and terrorists, Albinati builds a powerful and unstoppable narrative that courageously and openly address the great questions of life and history, as well as showing the other side of things.

Albinati was born in Rome in 1956 where he still lives and teaches literature at the city’s Rebibbia prison, an experience he writes about in his diary Maggio selvaggio (Wild May) published by Mondadori in 1999. Among his most recent books published in Italy is Vita e morte di un ingegnere (The Death and Life of an Engineer) published by Mondadori in 2012 and now available in the Rizzoli Vintage series.