La Scala Milan

Like a wedding at home.

Or a funeral.

If your in the expensive seats, then it’s the wedding of someone you like. For cheap seats or even the lesser box seats then it’s the funeral of someone you don’t like.

Don’t stress. Jeans aren’t ideal but if that’s the best you have, pretty sure they’ll still let you in. If you can take a step up from jeans and your tennis shoes are clean, even better.

We took nicer than usual dark clothes and my husband brought a jacket just for wearing to the opera. What we saw was that, just like at an opera at home, some people were very very dressed up, many people just looked ok, and some were dressed more casually but not like shorts and tshirt casual. It was March or early April and I was dressed way too warmly —- pretty sure there was no AC.

Shorts and Tan tops are expressly prohibited in the rules of the theater, so I wouldn’t go to that extent of casualness or you will not be admitted. You will feel comfortably dressed with a conservative business casual attire, like slacks, dress shirt, jacket. You won’t be left out without a tuxedo, although in certain class of seats men will almost certainly wear a tuxedo.