Milan Design Week this year felt quieter, sharper, more emotionally fine-tuned. Beneath the scale and constant movement of Salone, there was a noticeable shift away from novelty for novelty’s sake and toward atmosphere, material sensitivity, and spaces that asked to be felt slowly. Across galleries, apartments, foundations, and fashion houses, the strongest presentations were less about objects alone and more about creating entire emotional environments through light, reflection, shadow, and memory.
From Nilufar’s dreamlike domestic magic and Galerie Philia’s meditation on metal surfaces, to Vincenzo De Cotiis’ geological sculptural worlds and Dimoregallery’s cinematic bank headquarters, Milan increasingly blurred the boundaries between art, collectible design, architecture, fashion, and performance. Hermès approached the home through extraordinary studies in tactility and craftsmanship, while ‘Polish Modernism, A Struggle for Beauty’ offered one of the most intellectually resonant exhibitions of the week, exploring how beauty and ingenuity became forms of resistance in postwar Poland. Elsewhere, Benni Bosetto transformed performance into emotional choreography at HangarBicocca, Gabrielle Goliath brought tenderness and embodied memory into focus at Raffaella Cortese, and Bocci’s ‘Light as Medium’ dissolved lighting into atmosphere itself. The week also saw the launch of the Fendi Design Award, awarded to Swedish designer Gustav Craft for ‘Via’, reinforcing Milan’s growing investment in emerging collectible design voices.
The presentation that won Milan for me however, was ‘Materials at Edge’. It was one of those rare exhibitions where every room revealed something unexpected and unforgettable. The curation was intelligent, restrained, and deeply considered, with each work given exactly the right amount of space and tension. It was also the place where I discovered pieces that genuinely made me explode a little inside (Martin Calory!) and reminded me why I fell in love with art and design in the first place.
Here is my list of the exhibitions and presentations that stayed with me most this year.
Overall favourites
Naturally, I may be slightly biased toward the two exhibitions generous enough to include my work, but they were also genuinely among the strongest presentations I saw all week.
1. Nilufar Gallery, ‘La Casa Magica’
Curated by Valentina Ciuffi with creative direction by Studio Vedèt and scenography by Space Caviar, ‘La Casa Magica’ was exactly that: magical. Totally otherworldly and one of the freshest exhibitions of the week. The layering of symbolism, domestic ritual, fantasy, texture, and collectible design felt emotional rather than conceptual. I was lucky enough to present four pieces within the exhibition, including my Armand Bureau, a stainless table that I designed in Paris and named after my firstborn son. An edition of eight, the table was positioned front and centre in the window on Via della Spiga. Thank you so much to the Nilufar team for having me, it was such a delight.
2. Vincenzo De Cotiis, ‘Je Suis La Matière’
I had a personal tour with Henri Charreau from Carpenters Workshop Gallery and it was honestly breathtaking. Geological surfaces, reflective metals, blackened forms, monolithic structures; a creamy ivory and black bench sitting beautifully alone. The entire exhibition felt suspended between excavation, architecture, and cosmic ruin.
3. ‘Materials at Edge’, hosted within Giampiero Tagliaferri’s new Milan studio
‘Materials at Edge’ brought together a deeply considered dialogue between art and design curated by Truls Blaasmo and Chiara Rusconi, alongside Tagliaferri himself. The exhibition unfolded through a sequence of rooms that somehow became better and better as you moved through them, balancing tension, restraint, emotion, and material sensitivity with incredible precision. The works felt chosen not simply for aesthetics, but for their resonance with one another. It was intimate, intelligent, and confident. One of those rare exhibitions that reminds you exactly why art and design matter in the first place.
4. Galerie Philia, ‘How High the Moon’
Curated by Ygael Attali, ‘How High the Moon’ explored aluminium, inox steel, silver tones, reflection, weightlessness, and immaterial presence through a monochromatic landscape. The exhibition borrowed its title from Shiro Kuramata’s iconic wire mesh chair and revolved around this beautiful paradox of how something materially heavy can simultaneously feel suspended, intangible, and almost absent. Polished and brushed metal surfaces acted less like static objects and more like reflective membranes. I presented my Moulin Lamp as part of the show (thank you, Ygaël) against walls washed in the most delicious mint green. This colour worked perfectly against the cool silver tones of the simple palette. The atmosphere felt cinematic at moments. One of the more restrained exhibitions of the week, but deeply atmospheric and incredibly elegant.
Art highlights
Art is where my heart is, so visiting art galleries and institutions during Milan is always essential for me. I had the pleasure of a personal tour with Marc Spiegler, former global director of Art Basel, who generously walked me through some of his favourite exhibitions and spaces across the city.
1. Raffaella Cortese, Gabrielle Goliath, ‘Bearing’
One of the most moving exhibitions I saw all week. In ‘Bearing’, Gabrielle Goliath centred black, brown, femme, and queer bodies through intimate paintings and works on paper that explored what it means to carry, nurture, survive, protect, and hold one another through impossible conditions. The exhibition moved through ideas of motherhood, vulnerability, tenderness, intimacy, mourning, and care, but without sentimentality. There was something incredibly restrained and dignified about it. The figures seemed to exist suspended between strength and exhaustion, beauty and exposure. Goliath’s works challenge traditional representations of the body and the historical language of the nude. Parts of the exhibition felt quietly devastating, but also deeply loving. Afterward, Marc and I had tea with Rafaella Cortese in her cozy tea rooms inside the gallery. It was a privilege.
2. Massimo De Carlo, Pietro Roccasalva, ‘Io ti saluto, luce, ma con nervi offesi’
The gallery itself is a design dream. Originally a mid century Milanese residence, the building has been beautifully restored by the gallery, and before you even look at the paintings you are already distracted by the marble, bronze, timber, proportions, hinges, and extraordinary detailing throughout the space. Roccasalva’s exhibition brought together imaginary landscapes, paradoxical still lifes, allegorical figures, mythology, family imagery, and fragments of literature and philosophy into paintings which felt psychologically charged. The works move between the intimate and the symbolic, where everyday life and historical iconography somehow collide. The entire exhibition carried this strange tension between tenderness, memory, theatre, and hallucination. It was one of the most peaceful moments of my entire week.
3. Vistamare, Rosa Barba, ‘Tangible Kinships’
Worth visiting for the projection machinery alone. Rosa Barba’s exhibition explored the relationship between film, light, landscape, time, memory, and environmental change through installations that felt as sculptural as they did cinematic. At the centre of the presentation was Charge (2025), a 35mm film considering light as both a technological and environmental force, filmed across industrial landscapes and research infrastructures. Her analogue projection systems, rotating mechanisms, suspended screens, and flickering light sources became objects in themselves. The entire exhibition sat somewhere between cinema, astronomy, architecture, and speculative fiction, exploring how light shapes not only what we see, but how we understand the world around us.
4. Pirelli HangarBicocca, Benni Bosetto, ‘Rebecca’
HangarBicocca honestly leaves you speechless. The scale of commitment to art there is on another level entirely. Curated by Fiammetta Griccioli, ‘Rebecca’ transformed the vast industrial shed into something strangely intimate, inhabited, and alive. Inspired by Daphne du Maurier’s novel, the exhibition imagined architecture itself as a living female body, where rooms, surfaces, curtains, and thresholds seemed to breathe and hold memory. Layers of fabric, some sheer, some tied with ribbons, some opening into doorways you could physically pass through, created spaces that felt tender, suspended, and deeply personal.The live ballet performances brought another emotional layer to the work. Dancers moved slowly through the installation wearing nude coloured clothing. It was gentle, poetic, slightly uncanny, and incredibly moving. Bosetto’s work explored rest, dreaming, intimacy, sexuality, emotional states, and the body’s relationship to space in a way that felt soft rather than confrontational. There was an emotional intelligence to the entire exhibition that really stayed with me.
Better than expected
A few exhibitions completely surprised me this year. The ones I expected to like, but ended up genuinely loving. The kind you walk into casually and leave thinking about for the rest of the week.
1. Dimoregallery, ‘Piazza Affari’
Dimore completely captivated me. Their new headquarters inside a former bank building felt like stepping into a psychological film set. The silver safety deposit boxes inside the vaults were unforgettable. Marble, wood panelling, hinges, handles, lighting, every detail was art. The atmosphere was cinematic, elegant, unsettling, and incredibly intelligent.
2. Polish Modernism, ‘A Struggle for Beauty’
Presented by Visteria Foundation and curated by Anna Maga, this was one of the most intellectually rich exhibitions of the week. The exhibition explored postwar Polish design as a form of cultural resistance where beauty, craftsmanship, and ingenuity became survival tools. One sculptural stone bath with varying levels completely stayed with me. Functional and poetic at once. I wanted to dive in.
3. L’Artisan Parfumeur x Antoine Billore
A beautiful Milanese apartment transformed into an intimate cabinet of curiosities filled with antique furniture, scent, decorative arts, and layered domestic atmosphere.
4. Bocci, ‘Light as Medium’
Curated by David Alhadeff, Bocci’s presentation was one of the most atmospheric spaces of the week. The lighting, naturally, was impeccable. The entire environment had this humid nocturnal glow that strangely reminded me of night in São Paulo.
Creators of fashion and design
Milan continues to blur the lines between fashion, art, interiors, and collectible design in a way that feels increasingly seamless. Design here moves far beyond objects alone and into atmosphere, materiality, emotion, and space.
1. Hermès, ‘Unique Reflections’
Hermès once again reminded everyone why they are unmatched when it comes to craftsmanship and restraint. The presentation approached the home almost like sculpture through texture, leather, colour, tactility, and light. Every detail felt considered.
2. Yves Salomon Editions x Michael Bargo, ‘Kentucky Paris: An American Private Room’
One of the warmest installations of the week. Deeply personal and rooted in ideas of domesticity, Americana, quilting traditions, and intimacy.
3. Armani Casa
Restrained, architectural, precise. Armani continues to understand spatial luxury better than almost anyone. Quiet confidence rather than spectacle.
4. Fendi Casa and The Fendi Design Award
Fendi continued its exploration of collectible interiors while also launching the inaugural Fendi Design Award, awarded to Swedish designer Gustav Craft for ‘Via’, highlighting Milan’s growing support of emerging design voices. Gustav spoke beautifully, recounting his inspiration from the streets of Rome and reminding us to look at all of the details and never miss the magic.
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