Salone 2025: a two-way interview with Maria Porro and Carlo Urbinati

Maria Porro: We wanted to have two days devoted to lighting design, a topic that is of interest not just to professionals, but also to architects, interior designers and builders. The aim is to tackle the subject of lighting design in all its myriad facets, from the perspectives of professionals whose points of view can contribute to the evolution of the sector. It all stemmed from a discussion with the association, with Assoluce of FederlegnoArredo President Carlo Urbinati and with the association’s member companies, a discussion that first took place four years ago, which took in co-design, along with an excellent head curator, Annalisa Rosso, and then APIL, the Italian Association of Lighting Designers and the International Design Association.  

Carlo Urbinati: We realised that it was important not just to reorient Euroluce as one of the spokes under the Salone design umbrella, but that it was also strategic to allow the specific nature of the concept of lighting to emerge. We also wanted to include design specialists such as lighting designers and professionals interested in a more global discourse. After the 2023 edition, we wanted to take things further – to attract those people involved in the lighting world. We set ourselves the mission to use this opportunity as an occasion for the exchange of original ideas and to enable the awareness of such a fundamental topic to grow.  

MP: Light defines and influences the quality of places, but it is also bound up with energy saving, sustainability, and technological innovation. It has an effect on budgets, on the maintenance of buildings and concerns the construction of systems integrated into architectures. It is obviously tied to beauty, the aesthetic research linked to how we live in these places. Robert Wilson, who will be one of the guests of the Salone and whom I had the honour of chatting to in New York, is creating a major project on the soul of things, which will also be of fundamental practical significance for national and international museums. 

CU: Vitale. This is also why, in order to cover the topic in the round, we decided to invite the artist and master Bob Wilson to take part and who, in an ideal bridge with Milano Art Week, will dialogue with Michelangelo’s last, unfinished masterpiece with music by  Arvo Pärt in collaboration with the Municipality of Milan. For us lighting boffins, kicking off with this is the stuff of dreams.  

MP: Designers, architects, lighting designers, even theatre designers, who therefore deal with light in relation to time, which is a very interesting facet. There will be neurobiologists and scientists, major players in the construction industry, in constant dialogue. Also because the greatest innovations in the design of light and lighting fixtures, lamps and complex systems, often arise from insights deriving from different worlds. 

CU: The programme is packed with different and diverse people – from anthropologists to biologists by way of artists. It’s an expression of our eagerness and desire to discuss light as a concept, even in a provocatory manner, perhaps even influencing those who work with and talk about light all day and every day -  with the Forum we want to synthesise and try to trigger thought. 

MP: As a producer of content, the Salone endeavours to contribute to  this ongoing research and evolution, Euroluce brings fresh perspectives, which can open doors and new approaches for both designers and for businesses and companies.  

CU: The distinguishing feature of the organisation is that it’s a trade fair that brings demand and supply together in the same place. There’s a chance of meeting people from the same sector who never see each other or who aren’t in close touch – on this particular occasion, interface happens only because people are in the same physical space. Being together, in the same place, is a multiplier of benefits.  

MP: Our goal is the satisfaction of the participants, the exhibitors, who measure their own satisfaction on the basis of the quality and quantity of contacts they manage to make and the satisfaction of visitors on the look-out for innovative solutions. The greatest success for the Salone and for the companies is being discovered by people who hadn’t known about them.  

CU: I personally don’t think we’re working towards achieving great figures, but towards doing the best we can. The figures have to be taken into account, they’re useful, but they’re a means not an end. I hope above all that the Forum, and the Salone, will be an experience, not just an interchange.