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Milan Design Week 2018 has started and, along with it, many antique and luxurious palaces have opened their doors hosting collections of contemporary furniture and lighting design. ENG
Ever imagine swinging from the trees in a hammock made of plants? Spanish artist Ainhoa Garmendia is making the fantasy into reality. Her Naturalise installation features a hammock made out of soil-less living plants woven into a sturdy fabric. The piece is a statement that calls to fight our contemporary throw-away culture in favor of something lasting and living. ENG
You won’t believe your eyes! Bright colors, neon lights and luminous installations that alter your visual and physical perception of space and time is now on show in Milan. Stunning “Environments” exhibition of Lucio Fontana’s works will bring you through surreal sequence of spaces: from totally dark and soft-lined, to dazzling, monochrome, seemingly infinite, or even tight and anxious nine rooms. ENG
Milan is a city synonymous with cutting edge fashion and design. These two distinguished universes weave around and within one another producing intriguing results. The exhibition “I see colors everywhere” promoted by the clothing brand United Colors of Benetton on the occasion of the last Milan Fashion Week and held at La Triennale di Milano is one such occasion. ENG
Milan is a capital of fashion, design, luxury shopping …and art. Nevertheless, we often associate this city with contemporary global culture. It is, no doubt, also the place where to enjoy classic Italian paintings too. Milan counts over 80 museums. Among these 80, the historic Pinacoteca di Brera is to be the best known thanks to its wide collection in which, Francesco Hayez, Caravaggio and Raphael are only some big names not to miss. ENG
Italy’s biggest museum of natural history (which is also one of the largest ones in Europe), Museo Civico di Storia Naturale in Milan displays true marvels of nature. Huge shells, mollusks, dinosaurs, sea creatures as well as man our origins and evolution are all to be found in this incredible collection. ENG
This World Clock is something that every global citizen needs today. The simple yet incredibly clever device quickly tells you what time it is anywhere on the planet. Developed by Japanese product designer Masafumi Ishikawa, the tiny clock has 12 flat edges and a single hour hand. Each side corresponds to a city – and as you roll the clock from one side to another, the hand automatically changes its position to show the time in that location. ENG
Lounging around in a giant nest might sound like something out of a fairy tale, but thanks to this eclectic design by Italian artist Gianni Ruffi, it can be reality. Italy-based Gufram just released this surreal, human-size nest called La Cova. Complete with two “egg” pillows, it isn’t just a piece of furniture, but a piece of art that lets you get away from it all. ENG
This simple-looking bench hides a two-fold surprise. A closer look reveals that the ‘tufted’ bench is actually carved out of solid wood – and when you sit down it’s bouncy and soft! Valentijn Rieb and Andrea Schimmer perfectly replicated the iconic form of a Chesterfield bench while marrying the look of wood with the comfot of a springy seat. ENG
Ventura Design District is one of the spots showcasing experimental design and works of young creators during the Milan Design Week. Numerous small and big exhibitions that range from famous names like Ikea to emerging international designers occupy all the free ex-industrial spaces around via Privata Massimiliano Ventura. Going there is a great experience for all design enthusiasts, street-food lovers and eccentric-fashion addicted. ENG
Hemp is a sustainable supermaterial with a wide range of applications that go far beyond hacky sacks and beaded bracelets. An experimental project called Fabric-Action explores exciting new uses for hemp – including modular gardens, skateboards, swings, and even air purifiers. Each design emphasizes the intrinsic qualities of this natural, sustainable and fast-growing material while showing how hemp can fit the latest production techniques such as 3D-printing, CNC technology and laser-cutting. Click on for five intriguing hemp products from the Fabric-Action show at Milan Design Week 2017. ENG
Very green installation Flowerprint realized by Milanese office Piuarch in collaboration with Cornelius Gavril on the occasion of the Milan Design Week-2017 features over 2000 living flowers (and plenty fresh potatoes!) that have transformed a building in Milan into an incredible floral patterned board. 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.
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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
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.
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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
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
Jo Nagasaka from Japan had an ingenious idea to create twin cups while repairing old, broken pottery using an ancient Japanese art. His Twintsugi project, showcased at the “Alamaki! Design in Asia” exhibition at the 2016 Milan Furniture Fair, takes its roots from the Japanese culture as a contemporary interpretation of Kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing broken ceramics. The pieces are whimsical, beautiful and inspiring. ENG
Stunning 12 meters high Christmas tree decorated with thousands of lights and fineries, and crowned with a precious silver star-shaped tip magically appeared about a week ago in the heart Milan. |
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