Italian designer Michele De Lucchi is active part in the realization of an entire innovative installation at Salone del Mobile.
“The Walk” went on show from 14th to 19th April at the Rho Milan Fairgrounds, animating Pavilions 22 and 24 of Workplace3.0 – the innovative exhibition dedicated to design and technology for planning work spaces – with design suggestions and ideas.
Entirely dedicated to the work environment, “La Passeggiata (The Walk)”, is a great installation hosted inside the pavilions of Workplace3.0, conceived to create a unique area where innovative ideas studied to better live the work environment go on display, through new conceptual spaces and shapes.
“Walking helps keep anxieties and worries at bay” – says Luca Gianotti, author of “The Art of Walking – Practical advice for setting off on the right foot) – and reconcile mind and body.”
According to Wu Ming 2, “the art of walking is a visual art that confers the ability to look at the world differently.”
These concepts have informed world-renowned Italian architect Michele De Lucchi’s installation “The Walk”, a circular never-ending path through the labyrinthine meanderings of the workplace, which puts the stress on the importance of moving about even when in the office in order to spark the crucial stimulus for the creative process.
The installation, intended to indicate four parts of office life, is split into the following themed areas: The Club, Free Men, Agorà and Laboratory.
1. The Club
The Club is a sort of communication platform communication platform, where priority is given to socialising and interchange and the space is pleasantly informal, while being organised in such as way as to favour all possible forms of working.
The space is reminiscent of welcoming hotel reception rooms or airport lounges, which also offer a cup of coffee or a bite to eat.
2. Free Men
Free Men is a workspace designed for individual or group working, and should serve to promote the exchange of ideas and skills– on which the creative productive process is founded – while fostering the correct balance between “me” and “us.
Nourishing the creativity of individuals is actually just as important as developing potential for group developing potential for group work, and relational context has a fundamental role to play in both processes.
This themed area is characterised by many small structures, private spaces for meeting colleagues, writing, analysing, weighing things up alone or with others, and people are free to use their workspace as best suits them.
3. Agorà
Agorà is a pavilion designed to cater for meetings: conferences, presentations, screenings, exhibitions, shows and special events.
A place in which various types of meetings can be held, individual ideas presented and those of other people aired, enabling people to play their own particular role in the theatre of life, while fostering an all-important sense of community.
It can also become a workspace in which tables and chairs can be arranged for group work.
4. Laboratory
Finally, the Laboratory is where the creative process takes shape, culminating in documents, presentations and 3D prototypes, images, software and applications.
It is the area devoted to designing, exploring new tools and instruments, making up images and documents, where ideas and thoughts actually take shape and differing processes contribute to the consolidation of the community.
Michele De Lucchi thus takes us along a path that teaches us to “think of the workspace as a gymnasium for the mind, which means conceiving it as a place where relationships generate new ideas and possibilities. Offices of the future are changing landscapes, unfettered by convention, evolving spaces and perpetuate an endless stream of new ideas.”
“Philosophy is well worth believing in, and philosophy was born of walking. Living, working, producing, discussing, making decisions and evolving only make sense if we know where we are going and if there are good reasons to believe that that particular place or objective is worth reaching,” stresses De Lucchi.
About Michele De Lucchi
Michele De Lucchi
Michele De Lucchi was born in 1951 in Ferrara and graduated in architecture in Florence. During the period of radical and experimental architecture he was a prominent figure in movements like Cavart, Alchimia and Memphis.
He designed lamps and furniture for the most known Italian companies, as Artemide, Olivetti, Alias, Unifor.
He realized architectural projects in Italy and worldwide, that include residential, industrial, corporate and cultural buildings, as well as curating exhibitions for the Triennale di Milano, Palazzo delle Esposizioni di Roma, the Neues Museum Berlin and the Galleria d’Italia in Piazza Scala in Milan.
A number of projects for the city of Milan are currently under construction: the pavilions for Expo 2015 (Padiglione Zero, Expo Center, Intesa Sanpaolo), UniCredit Pavilion in piazza Gae Aulenti and the installation for the Pietà Rondanini at the Ospedale Spagnolo at the Castello Sforzesco.
For the Salone del Mobile 2015 De Lucchi has created “The Walk” for Workplace3.0, dedicated to his workspace vision.
