Installations and other Special Projects
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07 APR – 18 MAY
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09:00 – 19:30
A cultural programme that extends the experience beyond the exhibition space: installations, projects and works created by big names in cinema, art and design, exhibitions and events in the city and around the world.
Design Kiosk: discover the event
Appointment in the heart of Milan from 1 to 13 April with outstanding figures in the world of design and a selection of editorial products and design objects. A temporary space by DWA Design Studio in Piazza della Scala
Design Kiosk will be open from 1 to 13 April, from 10 am to 7 pm.
Design Kiosk: the calendar of events
Tuesday 1st April
6.30 pm, in Italian
Piero Lissoni in conversation with Serena Scarpello
Thursday 3rd April
6.00 pm, in Italian
Federica Biasi in conversation with Serena Scarpello
Saturday 5th April
6.30 pm, in Italian
Alessandro Valenti in conversation with Giulia Ricci
Monday 7th April
6.30 pm, in Italian
Aldo Cibic in conversation with Serena Scarpello
Thursday 10th April
6.30 pm, in English
Stephen Burks and Malika Leiper in conversation with Serena Scarpello
Friday 11th April
6.30 pm, in Italian
Olimpia Zagnoli in conversation with Pietro Corraini
Ph. Alessandro Russotti
Es Devlin. Library of Light
Library of Light is a Salone project in collaboration with the Pinacoteca di Brera and with the contribution of Milan based publishing house, Feltrinelli.
In the year of Euroluce, the Salone del Mobile has commissioned a monumental kinetic installation by Es Devlin, the British artist and designer, known as a ‘poet of light’. The work is being created within one of Milan’s most venerable landmarks: the Pinacoteca di Brera. The installation reflects a phrase by Umberto Eco that came to the artist's mind as she climbed the tall shelves of the Braidense National Library: “Books are the compass of the mind, they point to countless worlds yet to be explored.” Devlin’s luminous rotating sculpture is located in the centre of the 17th century Cortile d'Onore, which connects the Pinacoteca di Brera, the Braidense National Library and the Academy of Fine Arts. It is an 18 meter diameter revolving cylindrical sculpture formed of illuminated book shelves containing 3200 volumes. During the day, while the structure turns, the angled mirrored plane at the top of Devlin’s cylindrical sculpture will reflect the sun’s light into the columns, the statues of the portico and parts of the building never previously penetrated by the rays of the sun. At night, its illuminated structure creates shadow plays on the walls of the courtyard.
Find out more, read the in-depth article
Pinacoteca di Brera – Cortile d’Onore
A project by Salone del Mobile in collaboration with Pinacoteca di Brera and La Grande Brera With contribution of Feltrinelli
Free entrance, April 7 to April 21, from 9 am to 9 pm.
April 22 to May 5, 10 am to 7:30 pm (last admission 7 pm).
Talk
Tuesday 8th April
7 pm, in English
Weaving Indian Art
Vinita Chaitanya, Interior Designer, Founder Prism
Urmila Chakraborty, Writer, Specialist of Patachitra Folk Art
Malika Verma, Founder Border&Fall
Moderator: Cristina Kiran Piotti, Italian-Indian Journalist and Consultant
Motifs, tapestries, weaving, embroidery, interweaving. For a long time considered "just" a refined craftsmanship of excellence from the South of the world, but now increasingly recognised as an art form in its own right. In particular, in India, textiles are deeply intertwined with cultural expression, historical memory, gender emancipation and local identities. The world of design today takes on a fundamental role in literally weaving new sensitivities and fresh looks at these both ancient and contemporary practices.
Wednesday 9th April
7 pm, in Italian
C'era una volta il corpo
with Walter Siti, Writer, Literary Critic and Essayist Curated by Feltrinelli
Thursday 17th April - The Talk is postponed due to adverse weather to a date to be determined
6 pm, in Italian
Thought for Humans.
Matilde Cassani, Artist and Designer
Luca Cipelletti, Architect and Museographer
Margherita Palli, Set designer
Moderator Annalisa Rosso, Editorial Director e Cultural Events Advisor, Salone del Mobile.Milano
The theme of the 2025 Salone del Mobile.Milano communication campaign – Thought for Humans. – becomes an opportunity for a broad and multidisciplinary reflection on the role of the body in space. An exploration of the emotional and sensory aspects conveyed by direct physical experience, capable of opening new interpretative keys also for the world of design. Through different but profoundly connected practices – art, theatre, museography – a new way of thinking, inhabiting and questioning the centrality of the human being is investigated.
Ph. Es Devlin Studio
Robert Wilson. Mother
A project of rare intensity between art, light and sound, Mother, with music by Arvo Pärt, at the Museo Pietà Rondanini – Castello Sforzesco, in conjunction with the Comune di Milano | Cultura, is the first installation of the Salone 2025, which opens to the public on 6 April. With full respect for the installation designed in 2015 by Michele De Lucchi in the Ospedale Spagnolo, Wilson has created an installation that measures itself with the power of the ‘unfinished’, in dramaturgical dialogue with the Stabat Mater, a medieval prayer in the vocal and instrumental version by the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt. Mother takes the form of a sequence of music, lights and images lasting 30 minutes, which can be attended by reservation (ticket office of the Castello Sforzesco). The Stabat Mater will be played live – from 6th to 13th April, at 4.15 pm and 5.00 pm – by the Vox Clamantis ensemble, conducted Jaan-Eick Tulve, and by La Risonanza, conducted by Fabio Bonizzoni.
8 April – 18 May
Museo della Pietà Rondanini – Castello Sforzesco
Project curated by Franco Laera
Production Change Performing Arts
6 April admission free during Milan Art Week, upon reservation on Vivaticket
Find out more, read the in-depth article
Ph. ©Martina Galbiati / Archivio Change Performing Arts
Pierre-Yves Rochon. Villa Héritage
The French architect Pierre-Yves Rochon has designed an installation that affirms the importance of time and experience in an idea of the interior inspired by tradition, but reinterpreting it through a contemporary sensibility. The goal is to enhance the legacy of the past and project it into the future. Villa Héritage is a space in which design becomes a shared and timeless language, capable of creating a dialogue between all the arts and prompting people to reflect on the idea of transmission. Elegant and evocative, Villa Héritage redefines the concept of interior design, transforming it into a bridge that connects memory and innovation and where luxury is not just aesthetics, but a multisensory experience made up of harmony, culture and timeless overtones.
PIANO ALPANGE AT VILLA HERITAGE
Concerts from April 8 to 13, 2025 | Salone del Mobile, Milan
On the occasion of Salone del Mobile, Villa Héritage presents Piano Alpange: a series of daily piano concerts by Alpange, featuring Anne Lovett and Michael J. Jennings.
From Monday to Sunday, every two hours between 10:00 AM and 5:30 PM, the concert hall welcomes visitors into an immersive sound experience — a sensory pause at the heart of the fair.
Villa Héritage, designed by Pierre-Yves Rochon, celebrates the art of living. Alpange, an avant-garde piano, merges design and innovation to bring sound back to center stage.
An encounter between aesthetics and listening — to experience design with all the senses.
Villa Héritage – Pavilion 13-15
April 8–13, 2025
Concerts at 10:00 AM, 12:00 PM, 2:00 PM, 4:00 PM, and 5:30 PM
From April 8 to 12, concerts will be performed by Anne Lovet; on April 13, by Michael Jennings.
Find out more, read the in-depth article
Paolo Sorrentino. La dolce attesa
La dolce attesa (Sweet Waiting) is the project-installation by the filmmaker Paolo Sorrentino for the Salone 2025: a timeless space, an invisible bridge between present and future, in which desire is entwined with the fear of meeting destiny. A void to be filled or an opportunity to be welcomed. Because, as the Oscar-winning movie director says, “waiting is anguish. Sweet waiting is a journey that amazes and hypnotizes.” A middle ground where everything is still possible, where everything can – or could – be sweeter. For La dolce attesa, Paolo Sorrentino has chosen to rely on the contribution of Margherita Palli, a set designer with a career spanning forty years. The costumes, which are also by Margherita Palli, were created by the tailoring workshop of the Piccolo Teatro di Milano. The actors and actresses of the "Luca Ronconi" course at the Scuola del Piccolo Teatro di Milano also participate in the installation. Paolo Sorrentino has entrusted Max Casacci with creating a sound fabric that would mark its flow.
8 – 13 April
Fiera Milano, Rho – Pavilions 22-24
All the time slots for the installation are currently filled. Booking has now closed.
Find out more, read the in-depth article