“Even before it had opened, everyone was talking about it,” quips Natalija Nikitina. “It” would be Signor Lievito, the hot new Milanese boulangerie whose baguettes and bulkas and exotic Apulian focaccias are (almost) too good to eat. 

“The name is a tribute to the central ingredient, a mother yeast that is over 120 years old,” says the Latvian model-turned-baker, whose tryst with baking began during the lockdown. 

She snapped up a shop and tapped Hannes Peer—an architect and designer who had been associated with her family for over ten years—to breathe life into the interior. She was familiar with Hannes’s design approach. After all, he had designed the shops for N°21 (the fashion brand helmed by her husband), and overhauled their apartment not a year before.

A new-age bakery is no longer a place to simply buy delicious bread. This is where they can expect to discover fully immersive sensory experiences informed by colour, shape, and texture, reminiscent of the food on offer.    

As the interior started taking shape, a challenge emerged—the shop was petite, hardly enough to fit a sales counter, a small bar, an open workshop and a relaxation area. But Hannes had a trick up his sleeve: “Everything was made to measure—from the layout to the furnishings. Studio integrated everything into the architecture.” What resulted was an art gallery-esque aura, with abstract wall line drawings, cosy banquettes and portable chairs, and loaves on shelves that dazzled like little sculptures.