If you are planning a trip to Florence, you will be amazed how many things you will want to do and see in this city. It's difficult to decide either to start with the Brunelleschi’s Dome, Ponte Vecchio, a huge dish of fiorentina steak or the Uffizi Gallery. Yes, Uffizi! And you cannot skip this latter one because we all love and need outstanding Italian art.

Did you know that Milan has a special day for setting up Christmas decorations? While the rest of the world does it somewhere in late November or early December, northern Italians have the feast of Saint Ambrose, when they pull out Santa, garlands and other winter toys from their dusty boxes. Each year on December 7, Milan’s main Christmas tree switches on along with other thousands of cozy city Christmas lights and tiny home nativity scenes (presepe) that every Italian family gets ready for the Eve.

Each time it is very hard to say what was the best exhibition of Milan Design Week. However, there are always some single exhibitions that make our hearts beat faster and make us think that a three-zeroes cost of a single piece of design is a reasonable price.
Looking back at the MDW-2017 it is, no doubt, Local Design’s show in 5VIE design district located in the historical center of Milan that left one of the brightest memories of the week.

​Here’s something we’ve never seen before: a structure made entirely of pants! Starchitects Diller Scofidio+ Renfro just unveiled a sprawling pavilion made from 300 pairs of blue jeans in Milan. The installation is called Linking Minds, and it re-interprets the idea of using ready-made modules (in this case pants) in architecture. The surreal jean canopy soars over the historic Palazzo Litta in Milan. While the individual pairs of pants represent the human scale of urban life, the meshed twisted structure points to a sense of community and the collective nature of architecture.

​Today Milan Design Week 2017 has officially started. A great event for designers but also a unique opportunity for travelers to visit the most exclusive historical places of the city. Usually such precious locations are closed for public. However, in occasion of the MDW many of them open doors hosting collections of contemporary design.

​Milan Design Week is not for everybody? You are wrong. Even kids are welcome here. Still don’t believe it? Then visit La Triennale’s Giro Giro Tondo to discover the most baby friendly design museum ever.

ENG

​If you still haven’t visit the 15th Venice Biennale, you are running out of time. Only few days are left before the world’s most important 6-months long architectural exhibition will be ended. Opened on May, 28 it has been a great venue to see and get inspired. Missed it? No worries! Check our gallery below and step into the most exciting installations of the Venice Architectural Biennale 2016.

ENG

Have you ever thought about a perfect place to live in? Contemporary Italian architects constantly search for the answer trying to imagine a domestic environment that would fully meet modern lifestyles and one’s individual expectation. Sometimes, these ideas look rather like an abstract world of dazzling perspectives. Sometimes, they are visionary geometries and sometimes, pragmatic living solutions considering present-day difficulties of cohabitation typical of dense urban contexts. Or, in other cases again, spaces based on acoustic, tactile and other non-visional perceptions and ever-changing conditions. In few words, each of these tiny rooms is a surprising universe reflecting the past decades of an intense research on interior architecture that goes far beyond conventional practices.

ENG
​
This year's Nordic Pavilion at Venice Biennale went far beyond the classic protocol. Its interior, which was conceived as an extension of Giardini’s verdant public space, is a step-pyramid that reaches for the ceiling. Called “In Therapy” and curated by David Basulto, Archdaily’s founder and editor in chief, this informal wooden amphitheater is designed to create the perfect environment in which to have the ever so critical debate about how architecture can progress without disrupting the legacy of the past.

ENG

Would you ever believe that somebody could drill a hole in the centuries-old roof of Venice Biennale’s Arsenale in order to host a temporary installation? No way! And yet the stunning Lightscapes set up and its solar rays seeping through the ceiling are somehow there and sending a very strong message.

ENG

Did you know that the introductory rooms of the 2016 Biennale Architettura were built with 100 tons of material generated by the dismantling of the previous Biennale? 10,000 sq.m of plaster board and 14 km of metal studs: this is what the visitor will see stepping inside of Biennale’s Arsenale hall this year.

ENG

Japan’s national participation at “Reporting From The Front” in Venice looks as an out of scale built tiny town showcasing some of the most intriguing architectural designs recently realized in the country. Semi-public shared space is the key feature of each project. Indeed, sharing is what the Japanese Pavilion at the Architectural Venice Biennale 2016 wants to speak about. Sharing of values, lifestyle and, of course, of architecture. Topic crucial enough to win a special mention in National Participations.

ENG

This year Venice Biennale brings you to cloud nine. Literally!
Designed by the Zurich-based architect Christian Kerez, the Switzerland Pavilion offers a unique experience of stepping into a real cloud. Realized as an ultra slim shell in fibre-cement, this pavilion is an inhabitable sculpture. Take off your shoes and sneak in it through a tiny hole. Bumpy, wavy and rough interior that you will find inside looks like a real cave. Though it features a very small room, its infinite complexity and unexpected puzzling shapes will make you want to climb it all in order to explore it up to the smallest detail.  

ENG

How often did you hear that we are not supposed to touch anything in a museum? Do not do this, do not do that, just keep away, observe and do it in silence. Well, this is something you won’t hear visiting “City After the City” exhibition at La Triennale di Milano held at the former Expo Milan 2015 area. Encouraged to touch, sit, lay, try, feel intriguing pieces of design, visitors can fully experience the great selection of architectural furniture that mirrors changing lifestyle of big cities, and that goes beyond established limits and stereotypes regarding how a house is supposed to be.

Did you miss the 2015 Expo and decide non to wait in line for hours to visit the Italian Pavilion? No worries! Palazzo Italia is open again and completely free for everybody. Don’t miss your chance to see the number one venue of the Universal Exhibition held in Milan in 2015 now.

ENG

Milan is the capital of design. The most innovative and in-vogue designers come here to launch their most recent works. Milan, however, is also the capital of architecture and classic taste. So what happens when the two meet one another?

ENG

It is always great when designers have good sense of humor and positive vibes. Usually their pieces are full of surprises, fun and bold solutions easy to understand and therefore to employ. Alamaki! exhibition (which literally means “Oh my god!”), now on show at La Triennale di Milano, features such funky and out-of-expectation objects made by the 12 top designers from Asia.

ENG

​Walking on water with Christo? Sure, and it’s not a joke. This summer Iseo Lake will host a unique installation designed by the Bulgarian-born and New-York-based artist Christo Vladimirov Javacheff. Three kilometers of his striking yellow piers will link Sulzano, Montisola and San Paolo Island. It is better you come barefoot. The Italian summer is hot. The path is soft and smooth. And the waves will make this experience really dynamic. While being about 16 meters wide, piers will be walkable only in its central (8 meters wide) part. It is said, this temporary structure can host over 17,000 guests at a time, and anybody can come. Babies and their strollers are welcome too. About 200 keepers, 20 boats, divers and rescuers present day and night will guard your security and high spirit non-stop.

ENG

Hundreds of thousands of people are flocking to Northern Italy to walk on water. An extreme and unique art installation on Lake Iseo, wrapped in bright yellow fabric, realized by the New-York-based artist Christo has become one of the most popular experiences the country has ever provided. An astonishing 4,5 km-long, The Floating Piers is attracting up to 200,000 guests a day (which is 100 times more than the host town's population), according to Bresciaoggi. Take a look at our recently-captured photographs after the break.

ENG

I think we all need to believe in something and to experience some miracles time to time. Otherwise, why would 350,000 people in less than 1 week go to a tiny lake in the Northern Italy to walk on water. Indeed, 350,000 people came to see the Christo’s work, that is at least 10 times more than it was expected. A kind of pilgrimage.  

ENG

Night at the museum? Why not? If you are really ready for such a unique experience of passing an entire night at a museum all by yourself, do it in Milan. The Pirelli Hangar Bicocca Foundation,  famous for its contemporary art and design events, offers a very particular experience of spending the whole night in an exhibition hall packed with lighting installations by Carsten Höller.

ENG

Do you know the colors of the Italian flag and their meaning? Many maintain that Italian “fern green”, “bright white” and “flame scarlet” take their origins back in the Napoleon age and the French blue-white-red tricolor. And yet, why would the French blue be ever replaced by the Italian green?

ENG

One might say that the idea to build panoramic decks on the top of new skyscrapers is a new trend of modern architecture counting in a best case scenario only one hundred years. Still, by traveling to Italy, we might easily discover that local Florence visionaries realized this kind of viewing points half a millennium ago.