On the eve of the Milan derby in the northwest corner of the city, a queue crawls around a tattoo parlor covered in chicken-scratch graffiti. Teeming with slow-moving Friday traffic, the street features as many kebab restaurants as pizzerias. If Milan is one of the fashion capitals of the world, Armani and Versace must have missed this part of town.
The people waiting outside the tattoo parlor take numbers like they are at a deli counter. Taped to the walls are six red-and-black mock-ups of tattoos with words like “Milan Forever” and “AC Milan 1899.” Tattoos that would normally cost €150 are free, sponsored by the club. Many of the fans waiting in line say they already have the logo inked, so they opt for more symbolic renditions like the year of the club’s founding.
“People put Milan on their skin because they have Milan in their heart,” says Andrea Costa, owner of Spektrum Tattoo. “It’s better than getting a boyfriend or girlfriend’s name tattooed on your arm, because Milan will never betray you.”
Tattooed geckos and scorpions crawl up Costa’s face; his body is a Rosetta stone of runes and ink. Costa, 47, dips a needle into red ink, and when he scribbles on a Milan fan, one cannot tell whether it is ink or blood. Costa has tattooed recent club icons like Robinho and Gianluigi Donnarumma; he hangs out with club legends like Marco van Basten and Filippo Inzaghi on vacation. And while Costa jokes the club chose him for this project because he’s “the fastest tattoo artist in Milan,” Spektrum Tattoo holds a special place in AC Milan’s recent history.
After clinching AC Milan’s 19th Scudetto with a 3–0 win over Sassuolo in May, manager Stefano Pioli unknowingly had the Serie A medal snatched off his neck by pitch-invading fans during a raucous, prosecco-soaked title celebration. The next morning, Costa etched the number 19 inside an Italian-flag badge onto Pioli’s arm—a trophy that no one could take from him.
“I always said that after my first title [as coach], I would do something that would last—and I did,” Pioli told the media after winning the Scudetto, sporting his fresh ink.
But being king of Italy doesn’t mean you wear your city’s crown. The nature and irony of a derby is that while it is steeped in decades of history and tradition, its glory is fleeting and its memory can be short. Its bragging rights go to the side that won the last scrap. Its currency is revelry or resentment.
When asked whether he would ever tattoo an Inter Milan logo, Costa says, “Sure, but I’ll make them pay double for it.”
Unlike most derbies, Milan’s rivalry is not broken up by neighborhoods or locations, but by families. You are born into AC Milan or Inter like you are given a last name. The hatred is Montague and Capulet.
“My husband, my son, my family—all Milan fans,” says Rossella Durante, who waits for a tattoo of a heart holding the club’s crest in honor of her father. “I’d rather die than see them support Inter.”
It is 24 hours until the Milan derby, where 90 minutes will often seem like a matter of life and death for millions.
