An exciting new initiative is has been rolled out in Milan's elegant via Montenapoleone, the heart of the city's fashion district, this week as twenty eye-catching installations of the new Fiat 500C have been scattered, cementing the fashionable new car into the centre of Italy's style capital.

An exciting new initiative is has been rolled out in Milan's elegant via Montenapoleone, the heart of the city's fashion district, this week as twenty eye-catching installations of the new Fiat 500C have been scattered, cementing the fashionable new car into the centre of Italy's style capital.

This bold new idea is the creation of the Comune di Milano – Assessorato al Design, Eventi e Moda working in association with Fiat Automobiles. Twenty full scale (1:1) fibre-glass and plastic moulded examples of the 500C are now scattered along via Montenapoleone along with an array of large trees of varying shapes and sizes that sprout majestically from the roofs of the cars. This exciting initiative has been dubbed per fare un albero (to make a tree you start from a seed) which has been evolved from the line of a a popular Italian children's song.

The 500C installations are the work of celebrated Lecce-born designer and architect Fabio Novembre who has located his highly regarded studio in the city and whose wide design influences have covered everything from styling sofas, chairs and tables, to bars, restaurants and hotels worldwide. Most recently the City of Milan has celebrated this young designer's achievements with an exhibition of his work entitled Teach me the freedom of swallows which was housed in the city's Rotonda di Via Besana museum.

Glamorous via Montenapoleone is located right in the centre of Milan's world famous Quadrilatero della moda where exclusive boutiques from designers such as Armarni, Hugo Boss, Versace, Paul Smith, Salvatore Ferragamo, Alberta Ferretti, Valentino, Yves Saint Laurent and Alviro Martini, as well as fine jewellery shops, vie for the attentions of legions of fashion-conscious Italian consumers. The initiative got underway this week with the arrival on this street of the twenty 500C models, all dazzling in their attention-grabbing white finish with just darker colours to signify the tyre areas, and the project will run until September 5, with the lifelike art works set to be moved to other locations in the city during the duration of the campaign. The use of tall green trees to compliment the 500C's compact shape and the slogan per fare un albero signifies the link between Fiat and the environment and the carmaker's pursuit of efficient technology while the trees also aim to bring some welcome greenery to the city's busy streets. The project was the idea of MC2 media centre Fiat Group and Kinetic Italia, a division of global advertising giant WPP.