A Wes Anderson-Designed Cafe Just Opened In Italy

Italian contemporary art-and-culture complex the Fondazione Prada, in Milan, has officially opened Bar Luce, a cafe designed by renowned cult filmmaker Wes Anderson — and, boy, does it show.

Open as of this past Saturday, 9 May, and conceived by the Royal Tenenbaums director to be a place that "I would want to spend my own non-fictional afternoons in", Bar Luce has, according to a press release on the new cafe, preserved a handful of the space's original architectural and decorative details, including an arched ceiling that recreates a miniature version of the vaulted glass roof that rests over the city's Galleria Vittorio Emanuele.

The interior design is distinctly Anderson, drawing on 1950s-'60s Italian aesthetics and popular culture and evoking the visual choices made by the director for his 2013 short-film collaboration with Prada, Castello Cavalcanti. In addition, inspiration is taken from "two masterpieces of Italian neo-realism": Vittorio De Sica's Miracolo A Milano (Miracle In Milan, 1951) and Luchino Visconti's Rocco e i Suoi Fratelli (Rocco & His Brothers, 1960).

"There is no ideal angle for this space," Anderson said of the new cafe in a statement. "It is for real life, and ought to have numerous good spots for eating, drinking, talking, reading, etc.

"While I do think it would make a pretty good movie set, I think it would be an even better place to write a movie. I tried to make it a bar I would want to spend my own non-fictional afternoons in."

Take a look at Bar Luce in all its Anderson-esque quirkiness below.

If you're in Milan, Bar Luce is open from 9am-10pm daily. The rest of us will just have to look on wistfully from here.

Watch Anderson's previous collaboration with Prada, Castello Cavalcanti, below.