National Festival of Gorgonzola cheese

The National Gorgonzola Festival was conceived by the Pro Loco of Gorgonzola in 1999. The fundamental purpose of the Festival, which has continued in the years since, was to promote our city—which gave birth to and lent its name to the famous cheese—and to highlight a gastronomy where gorgonzola cheese is the star ingredient. In October or November, when transhumance occurred from the mountains to the plains, the town had an abundance of milk and curds, as Gorgonzola was the main stopping point before reaching the lowland barns for wintering.
The sole promoter and organizational manager of the event has always been exclusively the Pro Loco of Gorgonzola. However, to comply with the commercial regulations of the city and the Lombardy region, collaboration with the Municipal Administration was immediately sought for managing the public spaces to be occupied by exhibitors. By mutual agreement, a festival route was created that still allowed city traffic with alternative paths, without harming existing commercial activities, in line with municipal regulations.
A key choice for the Festival has been to invite "niche" exhibitors from all over Italy—both in dairy production and other artisanal products, gastronomy, beverages like craft beers and wine, and anything that pairs well with our gorgonzola. The visible result is the presence of Italian products often unavailable in standard commercial distribution.
To this gastronomic focus was immediately added a cultural one over the two days of the Festival, featuring conferences, historical reconstructions through the display—in dedicated spaces—of agricultural and dairy tools from the era of its birth. A constant every year is the painting or photography exhibition at Palazzo Pirola, an 18th-century villa of delight located in Piazza della Repubblica. The final choice, perhaps the most important, is to involve all age groups of visitors—from children to adults—with targeted initiatives: workshops for the little ones, the big Saturday night concert for teens and young people, tastings and recipes for adults.
In terms of numbers, there are 140 exhibition stalls along the festival route, with a regulated one-meter distance between them to avoid difficult-to-manage crowds. Numerous food service and production areas are set up along the entire route, arranged so that queues do not intersect, making it easier for visitors to stop and move around. In this regard, even though Gorgonzola has three stops on the Milan green metro line that handles heavy passenger traffic, parking is created annually for motorcycles and bicycles, caravans and trailers, cars, tourist buses, and a dedicated area for the disabled.
All these features led to the UNPLI (National Union of Pro Loco of Italy) awarding the "Quality Festival" label in March 2025, bringing further prestige to one of the most important events in the Martesana area!