Milan Design Week may have more people attending than ever, but it often seems to be focusing on an ever-narrower slice of society. Yes, it’s open to the public, and anyone willing to wait an hour (and scan a QR code granting access to their birthday, home address and high school report card) can eventually see whatever novelties are waiting behind the city’s giant Fuorisalone queues. Yet increasingly, it is only the elite few who can then go on to actually introduce those luxurious designs into their lives. While we don’t usually list prices for the furniture we show in Azure (and admiring beautiful, out-of reach things like supersized suede sofas is a standard part of our job), Milan’s growing focus on ultra-high-net-worth spenders had us thinking about bank accounts more than usual.
What’s more, the surging collectible market encourages buyers to approach furniture as a kind of commodity that will increase in value. Mind you, first-edition chairs by the Eameses — the ultimate champions of democratic design — now fetch a pretty penny at auction, too. Hopefully, there’s room for all income brackets to coexist in the industry, so let’s not lose sight of people who just need somewhere to sit. The good news: With a little searching, Milan still had a few gems to be found for non-astronomical prices. Here’s our post-show accounting exercise.
DESIGN FOR ALL
QuadroDesign’s Salone booth
How refreshing: The Italian faucet company’s fair display (by Milanese architect Giacomo Moor) will later be rebuilt as a community washroom in Masala, Zambia.
IKEA PS 2026
A $230 inflatable chair by Mikael Axelsson and a rotating $60 lamp by Lex Pott led the meatball maker’s latest collection of designer collabs, presented alongside a saluhall market and charming vignettes of domestic life around the world.
Bienvenue by Campeggi
What do you mean you don’t have a guest room? It’s still possible to comfortably host visitors in tight quarters — just unpack French designer Thélonious Goupil’s bed-in-a-box (pricing TBA), complete with a plump pump-up mattress and headboard-slash-room divider panel. The setup’s wooden storage crate doubles as a nightstand.
Moka Vite pot by Alessi
Philippe Malouin’s moka pot (available
in three colours and two sizes; from $175) is neither overly pricey nor precious. In fact, it takes its shape from a playful assemblage of scrapyard fragments.
Re-norm table by Muuto
Rather than a palazzo, Muuto again presented its novelties in an appartamento — a setting heavy on charm, less so on space. Maria Bruun’s urbane dining table ($3,670) fit right in.
MEDIUM RARE
Sabine Marcelis
The Dutch designer has mastered the art of high/low. After a January revamp of her donut-shaped IKEA lamp ($80), her Salone launches included additions to Arco’s Dew table series (from $6,000) and Plume, a totemic lava lamp ($$$).
Aposē lamp by Aesop
Working with Flos for production, the Aussie skincare brand launched its own trio of lights. Limited to a run of just 500, the table lamp costs €2,850, or 78 bottles of Resurrection hand wash.
PRICE UPON REQUEST
Stadium d’Hermès table by Hermès
Barber Osgerby’s masterpiece of marble marquetry (featuring Carrara Venato and Verde Alpi, to be exact) is the Birkin bag of dining tables. Honouring Hermès’s equestrian heritage, its rounded shape nods to both racetracks and “the curve of a horse’s back.”
MC72 by Poltrona Frau
Taking its aerodynamic lines from the Macchi M.C.72 Italian seaplane, Studio Paolo Ferrari’s stunning seating originated as custom furnishings for another form of transport: a client’s 74-metre Sanlorenzo superyacht.
Salone Raritas
The real one-per-center flex is one-of-a-kind design. Enter this new section of the fair focused on antiques and zany-yet-fabulous collectibles like Job Smeets’s faux fur rug with a built-in panther sculpture.
The post In Milan, Democratic Design and the Luxury Market Clashed But Co-Existed appeared first on Azure Magazine.
