Be Original, is the great communication project championed by Elle Decor Italia, supporting originality and industrial design.

“Design is one of the resources in this world of ours” !  “Creativity is a value” !

The Be Original project began in Nov 2012, when Elle Decor Italia launched a debate among all those involved in the protection of creativity and originality, and the battle against industrial design counterfeiting.

It has given rise to debate that aims to protect creativity and originality, in addition to combating industrial design forgery in Italy and the world.

The 100% Original Design exhibition in Milan’s historic Palazzo Reale, was presented to bring attention to the plight of industrial design piracy, and to discuss copyright protection in the world of design.

It was promoted by the Milano City Council Culture Department (Milano-Cultura) and produced by Elle Decor Italia

Design is Art, Milanese Art.  Just like Futurism, Design from Milan has conquered the world with the magic of a new language, a new way of looking at reality

The idea today ( taken for granted) that serial and industrial production must be beautiful, was born in Milan

An idea that Milan continues to enhance with new content, sustainability, and accessibility to a beauty that becomes a country’s heritage. The exhibition was Milan’s tribute to all the players in Design who since WWII have turned Milan into the capital of beauty

Milan undertakes to make sure that this wonderful adventure continues and grows

On show were 100 design products that have marked the history of living, that invented new typologies, and that innovated or changed the way people live.

Selected by an international committee, the original objects on show are all still in production, and cover the period from 1945 to today.

The post World War II products presented were chosen based on two criteria: as design icons, or as design pieces that have changed our everyday way of life. The message is strong: defend the ideas, the commitment to research, of those who design, create and produce products.

Product Design Industry Counterfeiting

The exhibition demonstrated the advantages of the “original design ” real deal versus FAKE copy products, and explained the values and history behind each original product.

Each piece was shown as part of an experience which involved the visitors in fun and entertaining presentations, with key video contributions.

Be original is a unanimous project in defense of copyright protection in design

Copying is ignoring a professional and ethical commitment to ourselves.  Copying is stealing, not only money, but also especially thought. Copying is damaging research and standardising production.

Yet those who copy hide behind demagogy , pretending that they have the common good at heart, yet never telling the real story. The real story is one of passions and delusions and is never banal.

The original which becomes an Icon- brings with it a Fake that we never appreciate

Creating an Icon is never a safe bet – we must observe how people behave and be able to surprise and reassure. At times it takes years of research and effort. Behind an Icon lies an Investment, and perhaps piles of impossible projects that went nowhere, but were perhaps necessary for achievement of the end result.

We must therefore defend in commercial terms this value that redeems all the previous failures.

We need to raise awareness and appreciation of the hard work done along the way and tell the stories of the names behind the products

But the story must be like the article : full of sense . True Beauty.

The 100% Original exhibition is an experiential journey that engages and fascinates visitors through the 9 rooms of the Palazzo Reale, on the first floor of the Royal Palace.

In a series of rooms and mirrors, with a progression of the objects in order of size, from the smallest to the largest , the path plunges the visitor into a multimedia experience all round.

Music , film , video, digital sets , reflections on the original design printed on the wall as a poster poster boards that tell whole creative process , from research to design to production , to bring to life the excitement of all those products that have changed the quality of people’s lives, from a functional point of view and aesthetic.

All thanks to the designers and producers’ original creativity.

Palazzo Reale has always paid careful attention to Design.

Its noble rooms have often hosted exhibitions in which Art and Design have conversed naturally with illuminating results.

In a happy visual short-circuit between the past and the future, with neoclassical decoration in a counterpoint to the formal purity of the great creations of modernity.

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To find an original that enhances your daily life, exceeds your expectations and makes you even fall in love , but above all an original you can trust and you do not need anything else.

100% Original Design is a reference point and a good omen for the future of design in a historical moment in which originality and creative thinking – even strong new craftsmanship – are returning as core values ​​.

Objects and furnishings show their innovative shapes , small and great technological advances they witness , interpretations of social needs and moods of which were carriers and explain why their stay in the imagination and in real life.

But they were also designed using brush strokes and especially on a long-term commitment and large investment put at risk from copies and fakes that stifle the sense of originality

A set of factors that are used to sum ​​up in one word: ICONS.

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Objects Selection for the Exhibition

The solemn Palazzo Reale welcomed creativity from Post World War II to today, popular in Italy and abroad by the founding fathers of international companies still custodians of a strong tradition of design and business, and dozens of designers and architects who have shared and share the story of original design.

The selection of objects, and was developed in collaboration with an Advisory Board consisting of:

• Luisa Bocchietto , President of ADI
• Beatrice Galilee , curator of the department of architecture and design Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Metropolitan Museum in New York) , as well as the Lisbon Architecture Triennale and director of the cultural association The Gopher Hole in London
• Alexander von Vegensack , co-founder and director of the Vitra Design Museum and President of CIRECA of Boisbuchet

and an Executive Selection Committee consisting of:

• Livia Peraldo Matton , Director of Elle Decor Italy
• Portia Bergamasco , journalist and independent curator
• Laura Maggi, Editor Elle Decor Central Italy
• Bettina Red, Editor in Chief of Elle Decor trends in design and Italian
• Alessandro Valenti, Consulting Editor elledecor.it
• Maria Cristina Tommasini , journalist
• In collaboration with the editors of Elle Decor Italy

Conference on Design Copyright Protection Laws

Recently, at the Palazzo Reale in Milan, the main exponents of the world of design, the system of Italian sector of politics and culture have found themselves at the conference organized at the conclusion of the first part of the project Be Original , promoted Elle Decor Italy under the patronage of the Municipality of Milan.

Cristina Tajani, Deputy Mayor of the City of Milan Policies for the job , Economic Development , University and Research

The event, moderated by Alessandro Cecchi Paone , was introduced by the editor in chief of Elle Decor Italy Livia Peraldo Matton , by CEO Hearst Magazines Italian Moletto James and Cristina Tajani, Deputy Mayor of the City of Milan Policies for the job , Economic Development , University and Research .

At the microphone, speakers took turns with different skills , belonging to the legal field , to that of associations , industrial and cultural.

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The work was completed with the delivery of the Manifesto of concrete proposals prepared with the contribution of experts in different fields to Daniela Maini , President of CNAC , National Council Anti-Counterfeiting .

LUISA BOCCHIETTO , PRESIDENT ADI ( ASSOCIATION FOR INDUSTRIAL DESIGN ) WITH JAMES MOLETTO OF HEARST MAGAZINES ITALY

Advertising Campaigns

All this is summed up in the slogan of the campaign Be Original , produced by Giovanni Gastel , sponsored by Elle Decor Italy and published in all the journals of the group Hearst Magazines Italy in December 2012.

Be Original Part , the campaign of Elle Decor Italy that – through the lens of a great photographer – says the values ​​of authentic design .

It is the first time that a magazine moves to raise consumer awareness about the choice of the original , not pirated copies . Why authenticity is a serious matter

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The exhibition 100% Original Design is the culmination of this great initiative to raise awareness, but also an interchange with the visit, and how many will become ambassadors of Italian and international design .

Claudio Luti , Kartell’s president and COSMIT with Livia Peraldo Matton , director of Elle Decor Italy

About the Palazzo Reale di Milano

The Royal Palace of Milan was the seat of government of the Italian city of Milan for many centuries, but today is an important cultural centre, home to expositions and exhibitions.

Originally designed with a system of two yards, then partially demolished to make way for the Duomo, the palace is located to the right of the facade of the cathedral in the opposite position with respect to Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. The facade of the building, following the line of the ancient courtyard, forming a recess with respect to Piazza del Duomo, known as the Piazzetta Reale (English: Small Royal square).

Of particular importance is to remember the Hall of Caryatids on the first floor of the building, which occupies the site of the old theatre burned in 1776 and is the only environment survived the heavy bombing of the 1943 when it lost the neoclassical interiors