As we bid a fond “arrivederci” to this year’s Milan Design Week, it’s time to assimilate the impressions of the more than 3,000 brands on show around the city last week. From furniture and lighting, to technology and architecture, Milan remains a centre for creativity.
The ubiquitous use of colour added to the playful, childlike element of the Salone del Mobile. La Triennale di Milano featured Giro Giro Tondo, an exhibition of Italian Design devoted to the world of children, while at Superstudio, designer Tokujin Yoshioka imagined the future through a child’s eyes when developing the futuristic S.F chair for LG’s impressive S.F_Senses of the Future installation. Using cutting-edge technology from LG, the designer created seventeen illuminated chairs made from thin, double-sided organic light-emitting diode (OLED) that emitted brilliant flashes of colour across each surface.
Nendo presented a more subdued, but no less impressive installation at the store of fashion designer Jil Sander. The Japanese design studio, headed by Oki Sato, presented Invisible Outlines, a collection of works based on how we identify and position objects by subconsciously following invisible “outlines”. The action of opening a door or drawer and 3-D graphics were brought to life, while a poetic, jellyfish-like collection of submerged vases showed a delicate, moveable boundary between the objects and water, defined only by colour.
Sustainability has become an increasingly prevalent element within design. From renewable materials such as bamboo, to traditional hand craft techniques, among all the technology and innovation, it is good to see that the human element of design is alive and flourishing. One of the most beautiful examples of sustainability in the city is Il Bosco Verticale – Vertical Forest – a pair of apartment blocks whose facades are home to almost 17,000 species of trees and plants. Designed by Boeri Studio and completed in 2014, the 76 and 110 metre high landmarks have become a model for green building.
