"The Duomo di Milano (Milan Cathedral)"

The plan consists of a nave with four side aisles, crossed by a transept and then followed by choir and apse. The height of the nave is about 148 ft, with the highest Gothic vaults in a completed church.

The cathedral was built over several hundred years, led by several dozen different architects, in a number of contrasting styles. Art critic

John Ruskin commented acidly that the cathedral steals "from every style in the world: and every style spoiled. The cathedral is a mixture of Perpendicular with Flamboyant, the latter being peculiarly barbarous and angular, owing to its being engrafted, not on a pure, but a very early penetrative Gothic … The rest of the architecture among which this curious Flamboyant is set is a Perpendicular with horizontal bars across: and with the most detestable crocketing, utterly vile. Not a ray of invention in a single form… Finally the statues all over are of the worst possible common stonemasons’ yard species, and look pinned on for show. The only redeeming character about the whole being the frequent use of the sharp gable ... which gives lightness, and the crowding of the spiry pinnacles into the sky." The plastered ceiling painted to imitate elaborate tracery carved in stone particularly aroused his contempt as a "gross degradation".

While appreciating the force of Ruskin's criticisms, Henry James was more appreciative: "A structure not supremely interesting, not logical, not … commandingly beautiful, but grandly curious and superbly rich. … If it had no other distinction it would still have that of impressive, immeasurable achievement … a supreme embodiment of vigorous effort."