Member-only story
Day 46: life in Italy under lockdown. Can Italian creativity redesign the future?
This week was supposed to be Design Week in Milan, the biggest business event of the year in this business-minded city. Not even Fashion Week, held twice a year usually in February and September, comes close. Last year Design Week generated more than 220 million euro (about US $240 million). I wouldn’t describe it as the Grand Prix of design events, but rather the Monaco Grand Prix. It is so prestigious that designers, architects, builders, bankers, and celebrities from all over the world have poured into the city — and poured money into the city’s coffers — in past years to be part of it.
Design Week began 59 years ago as a furniture trade fair called Salone del Mobile, but it grew over time as appreciation for Italian furniture expanded worldwide. The Salone came to encompass textiles, accessories, appliances, lighting, office systems, kitchens and bathrooms, and became so large that some categories (offices and lighting, kitchens and baths) have been held on alternating years: offices and lighting were featured in 2019 and kitchens/baths were supposed to be this year.
Part of the reason for the growth was a new exposition site inaugurated in Rho (a community just outside the city proper) in 2005. This fairgrounds offers 345,000 square meters of covered space and 60,000 more in…
