Dear friends,
This year again, I spent five intense days in Milan, exploring the Salone del Mobile and the Fuorisalone. But this time, a deeply critical sentiment began to take shape. Something is changing. Amidst lights and shadows, the week still offered fascinating ideas and inspiring moments. I admit it: it remains an extraordinary experience.
The Salone del Mobile (at Rho Fiera) continues to serve as a vast showcase for brands — though increasingly dominated by corporate giants rather than small, independent firms. These large companies use the Salone to stage grandiose, often excessive displays, well beyond any basic principle of economic sustainability. I saw individual stands spanning thousands of square meters, costing millions of euros, often with a questionable elegance-to-cost ratio, and with endless queues of visitors waiting to enter. Are we perhaps witnessing a return to an aesthetic and cultural crisis where excess, in every sense, must prevail? Walking through the halls, the feeling was that of a vast street market where everyone — and I mean everyone — was trying to shout louder than the rest, aggressively pushing their products. Pure style, in its truest sense, was not what lingered in my mind as I left.
And the Fuorisalone? Extraordinary, intriguing, but also veering off course: the word “design” has become a convenient pretext for anyone seeking to attract attention. Nevertheless, there were some unmissable gems, like Dropcity — a project beneath the railway arches of the Central Station, showcasing emerging studios and international collectives with a focus on more authentic design. Or rare, beautifully curated installations like Aesop’s, which transformed the cloister and sacristy of the Carmine Church into a meditative journey through material and time — an almost poetic experience, rare to find elsewhere.
I also visited Laboratorio Paravicini, a Renaissance-style workshop handcrafting spectacular, hand-painted tableware: a place where tradition converses with contemporary design without losing an ounce of poetry. And a special mention must go to Grasssoul, a brilliant Czech glassworks presenting breathtaking glass funeral urns — the most beautiful I have ever seen.
In short, however, there is a “but”: each passing year, the Salone del Mobile and Fuorisalone seem to lose a bit of their original soul. Milan Design Week has now become a grand international luxury festival, resembling more a frantic marathon to collect as many invitations and visit as many locations as possible (most of which no one can realistically attend or enjoy). Fashion brands and companies unrelated to true design increasingly dominate the schedule with lavish events, often out of context, stealing the spotlight from those genuinely dedicated to advancing the design world. The endless queues, the background noise, and the constant rush have made it harder to truly appreciate the most thoughtful, values-driven projects. Unsurprisingly, there is a growing appreciation for more curated formats like Paris Design Week — more compact, refined, less chaotic, and much longer (ten days compared to Milan’s five) — offering a clear, cultivated orchestration across the city, something Milan currently lacks (or at least does not visibly achieve).
Still, the magic of Milan endures. If we learn to be selective, to slow down, to choose carefully, it still has the power to offer us authentic discoveries.
If I could give you one piece of advice for next time: choose a few events, the ones that truly resonate with you. Stop, listen, observe. Don’t chase the urge to see everything. True design isn’t found by rushing from one location to another — it’s found by slowing down enough to hear its voice and breathe in its essence.
