“Life is more important than architecture”  …………. Oscar Niemeyer (1907-2012)

Oscar Niemeyer liked to repeat this statement  in his conversations and these words lie behind the theme of the exhibition produced by Interni for FuoriSalone 2019.

The focus of this years’ exhibition was to put human beings and their vital needs back at the centre of design.

To foster an anthropocentric vision of architecture, but also of the design of objects, systems and networks, means taking the physical and psychological well being of people as the horizon of references, in relation to the various spaces in which they live and work.

A criterion that in its simplicity seems like the most useful to correct the many discrepancies of the present, which from the reign of technology to the looming presence of the web, from the consumption of land surface to the pollution of the seas, seems to have forgotten the ideals connected with quality of life, from both an ethical and an aesthetic standpoint.

So much so as to lose sight of the most concrete, profound necessities of human beings: wellness and balance, memory and history, imagination and relations, knowledge and discussion, the desire for beauty and the protection of the environment.

In the context of design the theme inspires the creation of new objects and processes that aim at improving existence and coexistence: autonomous and sustainable transport, devices and systems for communication, digital technologies for care and sharing, evolved materials, high production quality, starting with food, the primary vital element, and projects for the support of communities on the part of institutions.

Human Spaces, then, are all the projects of places, environments, territories and contexts, and by extension services and objects whose central focus is a vision of personal well being.

The Human Spaces event as usual brought a festival of original works to the courtyards and loggias of the Università degli Studi di Milano, the Orto Botanico di Brera and – for the first time this year – to the monumental Torre Velasca, the Piazza Sempione, with the Arco della Pace and the Caselli Daziari.

Interni asked the architects and designers participating in this year’s edition of the event to translate the concept of ‘human space’ into experimental installations, starting with the furnishings that surround us and extending to urban mobility.

From the natural environment to macro-system of production, such as the virtuous – and by now necessary – circular economy.

In collaboration with partner companies and institutions, over thirty installations have been created for the show, envisioning a future in which nature and the planet are protected, resources are saved and artificial intelligence is applied for the common good, promoting personal well being.

Interni’s director Gilda Bojardi during the Human Spaces press conference in the Aula Magna of the University of Milan. April 8th, 2019

About Oscar Neimeyer

Oscar Niemeyer – Brazilian architect (1907-2012).

A leading figure among South American architects, he helped introduce the rationalist theories already widespread in Europe into Brazilian culture, collecting Le Corbusier’s popularizing lesson.

His work has received important awards, including the Pritzker Prize (1988) and the Praemium Imperiale (2004).

Interni 2019 Exhibition- Human Spaces

Central Courtyard Installations

Maria Cristina Finucci

Help The Planet

A project of ethical and media impact created by Maria Cristina Finucci and curated by Alessia Crivelli lights up the central lawn of the Cortile d’Onore.

With about two tons of plastic caps – gathered with the help of Università Roma Tre and Caritas – contained in red mesh sacks used for food packaging and enclosed in a metal framework, Finucci makes four gigantic letters of the world HELP: an appeal to mankind to stop the poisoning of the seas.

The installation covers an area of 19 x 15 meters.

This is the third time the artist has sent out an SOS, after writing HELP at the Foro Romano (2018) and on the island of Mozia in Sicily (2016).

“During the course of the years in which I have created installations in different parts of the world to protest the invasion of plastic in the oceans,” she says, “my project has been transformed, going beyond the limits of the environmental question and putting the individual, and the entire life of the planet, at the center.”

In 2013, in Paris, Maria Cristina Finucci founded the Garbage Patch State, a federal state composed of five islands formed by plastic abandoned in the oceans, with a total size of 16 million square kilometers, making it the world’s second largest country in terms of area.

Architect and artist Maria Cristina Finucci presents a work that sums up the environmental malaise of this millennium.

Covering an area of 19×15 meters on the lawn of the Cortile d’Onore, the installation has been made with One Ocean Foundation by Officine Maccaferri.

With the participation of Ariston Thermo which presents The Ariston Comfort Challenge, a climate research mission in Greenland.

Andrew Waugh

Multiply Milano

What happens to the materials of a building when its life cycle is over? How can they be reutilized and recycled?

These questions are increasingly important to reduce the consumption of limited natural resources, to combat pollution and to counter climate change.

MultiPly Milano (a version of the project based on the original model shown at the V&A Museum in London in September, during the London Design Festival) proposes the idea of using thin structural panels in CLT (Cross Laminated Timber) that can be easily dismantled, reconfigured and recycled (if burned, they can be transformed into bio-fuel).

The installation, located in the Cortile d’Onore, is composed of a flexible system of 16 box-like parts of American tulipwood, one of the most widespread wood species in the United States and one of the most sustainable, with remarkable properties of strength with respect to weight. Designed by Waugh Thistleton Architects and produced by AHEC – American Hardwood Export Council, together with the engineers of Arup, the project interprets its mission in a simultaneously recreational and educational way.

The labyrinthine spaces formed by the interconnected modules lead visitors through staircases, corridors and open/closed zones, inviting them to explore the potential of sustainable wood in architecture.

The MultiPly Milano installation designed by Waugh Thistleton Architects with Arup and produced by AHEC – American Hardwood Export Council uses a flexible system of 16 boxed parts (each 2.6 meters per side) made with American tulipwood CLT panels. ph. Saverio Lombardi Vallauri

M & S Lab

The Perfect Time

The Perfect Time is the title of the installation designed by Ico Migliore with M+S Lab for Whirlpool, with a focus on the W Collection oven.

The installation by Ico Migliore with M+S lab, where the protagonist is Whirlpool and its W Collection oven with 6th Sense technology, defines a space to cross and inhabit as a multisensory experience, in close relation to the product on display, opening outward for relaxation and contemplation.

M+S Lab is a container of research and experimentation that involves young professional figures from different fields, contaminating technical know-how with a more humanistic vision towards an inclusive conception of design.

Whirlpool is the brand that through advanced, intuitive technologies converging in the 6th Sense represents the perfect fusion between design and performance to improve life in the home, thus reclaiming the possibility of “Perfect Time.”

In close relation to the theme, the space of the installation has been approached as a sort of intelligent and permeable organism, to cross and inhabit in a multisensory experience. Walking into the installation means discovering different times and scenarios.

Venturing into a forest of light parts in white and transparent PVC, at full height, a landscape takes form, where perception varies from day to night.

At the enter a large transparent bubble contains a cubical volume (about four meters per side) with golden nuances, welcoming visitors into an immersive space expanded by mirrors, environmental videos, lights, sounds and graphics, in dynamic narrative sequences.

Piuarch

The Forest of the Violins

“The installation speaks of a lost forest, of absence; a project in which trees uprooted by the wind become an element of vivid symbolic value, demonstrating the destructive force of nature.”

This is how the architecture firm Piuarch describes The Forest of Violins, a moving tribute to the territories of Trentino struck by catastrophe in 2018, when storms felled about 14 million trees, including the famous ‘resonant’ Norway spruce trees of the forest of Paneveggio, in Val di Fiemme, whose wood is used to make violins.

Two uprooted trunks, 12 meters in length, protrude from the loggia, supported by a giant trestle made with wood from the same forest.

The beams, hewn and assembled, give rise to an archetypal form that establishes a dialogue with the loggias of the cloister.

The installation, made with the support of the Provincia Autonoma di Trento, the Magnifica Comunità di Fiemme and the contribution of CityLife, becomes a place of active memory where architecture – represented by the trestle, the symbol of repair work – is what remains.

Two Norway spruce trunks about 12 meters long, supported by a trestle in unfinished wood with a height of 8.5 meters and a width of 7,6, extend from the loggia of the Cortile d’Onore.’

Parisotto + Formenton Architetti

Passage in Blue

The contemporary version of a primordial cave: the firm Parisotto + Formenton Architetti has created a symbolic place, a quiet room for a relaxing break.

Blue Passage is an imposing tunnel with a double entrance, open to the outside and tapered at the center, to walk through or to spend time in.

A monomaterial space, permeable to view, made in Cimento, an innovative patented material that conserves the expressive impact of concrete but is lighter and more versatile on a structural level.

Simultaneously open and closed, light and solid, this novel work of architecture plays with the senses and perceptions of visitors, stimulating them through four different keys: the imperfect texture of the material (smooth on the outside, rough on the inside), the selected colors (gray for the outer surface, blue inside), the game of perspective between inside and outside, and the continuous reproduction of the sound of the sea, which becomes musical and follows the visitor in motion through the ‘shell’ of Cimento.

The installation by the firm Parisotto + Formenton Architetti is made of Cimento, a brand of the custom furnishings company SAI Industry.

Cimento is an innovative and versatile patented compound, over 90% in mineral aggregate mixed with a cementitious binder.

It permits the creation of light structures with the same visual impact as concrete.

The monomaterial

Marco Acerbis

Alter Ego

The relationship between people and space, seen as architectural context but also spaces for everyday life, is increasingly important. Including the outdoor dimension.

This is the premise behind the project by Marco Acerbis with Unopiù for the three open-air lounges around the lawn of the Cortile d’Onore.

The installation calls for the insertion, amidst the various furnishings, of metal silhouettes of human figures in natural size: they establish a dialogue with the visitors who use the seating, creating a game of reflections between people and their replicas as silhouettes in various moments of the day, as if captured by a snapshot.

These outdoor lounges become a sort of stage where the activities of social and individual existence – play, relaxation, sports, recreation – are representation and reality at the same time, also in an institutional setting like that of the State University.

The lighting at the base of the figures completes the theatrical effect in the evening.

Massimo Iosa Ghini

Human Proportions

The installation by Massimo Iosa Ghini has a trapezoidal form that sums up the path of perspective with a wider entrance with respect to the final part of the enclosure.

Ten meters long, with height varying from two to six meters and width from four to one in the final section, the structure takes the human body as its reference point, creating the initial effect of something non-finite, connected to time, distance and the desire to reach what seems unreachable.

It terminates in the awareness of the idea developed by Palladio for the Teatro Olimpico of Vicenza, of inverse geometric proportion with respect to the starting point.

A human silhouette, dressed and accessorized with a tablet, made with 3D printing and about 70 cm tall in the terminal part of the mini-architecture functions as a perceptive paradigm to convey the sensation of depth and dynamic proportioning of the space.

It also grants meaning to the figure of the suspended veil, the entrance wing, and the extraordinary design flexibility of the controlled technical lighting system inside.

The structure designed by Massimo Iosa Ghini is composed of a metal framework, produced by Manni Green Tech, that forms the perimeter frame for waterproof infill materials by Knauf Italia.

The same technology is used to line the inner walls in plaster.

The entrance wing is by Corradi.

Raffaello Galiotto

Regeneration

An outdoor installation conceived as a space of wellbeing, in which the natural elements are a source of replenishment of psychophysical energy.

A habitat that evolves, a concept that moves from protection to regeneration.

The project created by Raffaello Galiotto is like a room in the open air, accessed from two sides, formed by the stacking and rotation of ten square rings.

The dynamic twisting architecture, 7 meters tall, is composed of 688 modules of regenerated plastic; known as Komodo EcoWalls, the outdoor dividers are the first product of the outdoor furniture maker Nardi entirely in plastic taken from products at the end of their life cycle.

To regenerate body, spirit and matter.

This is the objective with which Raffaello Galiotto has created a twisting architectural enclosure, accessed on two sides, formed by ten square rings, stacked and rotated.

Marcantonio

Giraffe in Love

The Cortile d’Onore hosts the installation Giraffe in Love, a project based on collaboration between the designer Marcantonio and the brand Qeeboo.

Two dreamy sculptural giraffes support a classic chandelier in the Maria Theresa style: Giraffe in Love is a tribute to the world’s tallest mammal, one of the species most at risk due to poachers.

A beautiful animal with amazing spots, installed in Human Spaces “because it represents irony and lightness,” says Marcantonio, “it is in love but does not yet know it, and having its heart far away from its head it experiences love in a carefree way.”

The version in the exhibition is 4 meters high – the natural size of a young giraffe – and is made of fiberglass. It supports a chandelier at a height of 2.2 meters.

Marco Fagioli

L.U.C.E Public

The designer Marco Williams Fagioli, in collaboration with the Umbria Region, has imagined and produced an installation composed of five luminous volumes in semi-transparent fiberglass, reproducing anatomical details drawn from the plaster castings – made and donated by Vincenzo Danti in 1573 to the Museum of the Pietro Vannucci Fine Arts Academy of Perugia – of the original sculptures of the Medici Chapel made by Michelangelo.

The works have been reformulated as furnishings for urban spaces to provide public lighting.

The five elements in semi-transparent fiberglass start with matrices from which it is possible to produce a limited number of copies, each different from the next.

The project is based on a challenge: to define an overall vision of the city in a European key, in which the infrastructural aspects are combined with the digital, mobility, social and architectural quality.

A path in which the Umbria Region is the promoter and catalyst of a renewed approach to urban policies, with the objective of spreading culture, expertise and professionalism across the territory.

Vivian Coser

Brazilian Stone Scape

The intense impressions of Brazil, her country of origin, and of the exotic stones with vibrant colors that form the rocky landscape, are the sources of inspiration for the installation by Vivian Coser, produced with Abirochas and Apex-Brasil, in the Cortile d’Onore.

The relations between man and nature are summed up in a configuration of organic forms with accentuated curves, which interpret the traces and character of a specific environmental and cultural genius loci.

The project is like an enveloping lounge, containing a set of Botanique coffee tables stacked in a dynamic balance.

The setting is enclosed by dense vegetation installed for the occasion (the average height of the plants is 120 cm), which lights up in the evening thanks to a series of direct spotlights shining upward on the sculptural table-landscapes and on a Philodendron undulatum tree, the protagonist in one corner of the area.

This is the most explicit reference to a nature that seeks a dialogue with contemporary man, stimulating him to shape his environment in order to rediscover tranquility and wellness.

Brazilian StoneScape is the installation by Vivian Coser produced with Abirochas (the Brazilian association of the ornamental stone industry) and Apex Brasil (the Brazilian agency for trade and investments) inside the Cortile d’Onore, as a design island.

The Loggia / Cloister Projects

Dorota Koziara, Mariusz Miekos, Karim Rashid

Sacred Geometry

An outdoor exhibition retraces the history of one of the oldest and finest glassworks in Poland, Krosno Glass, founded in 1923.

The exhibition created by Dorota Koziara (also curator of the brand’s historical collection) and Mariusz Miekos is located under the portico of the Cortile d’Onore of the State University.

Featuring columns clad in colorful materials that suggest the form of gigantic overturned goblets, the installation presents a selection of historic glass objects created by Polish designers from the 1950s to the 200s, inside a series of display cases, as well as the proposals of the new brand Krosno D’Sign, which makes its debut precisely at Human Spaces.

In the company’s intentions, Krosno D’Sign will include new works by Polish creative talents, but also items by international designers like Karim Rashid, such as Sakred, the first collection of the new brand, also on view inside the installation.

Columns covered in colored material suggest the image of overturned goblets, while a series of display cases are set aside for the collections of one of the oldest Polish glassworks: these are the ingredients of the installation Sacred Geometry, produced by Krosno Glass based on a project by Dorota Koziara and Mariusz Miekos inside the portico of the Cortile d’Onore.

Valoppi Noarc

Design : A Voyage in Italy and Spain

Design: A Voyage in Italy and Spain is a competition organized by the Italian Embassy in Madrid, in collaboration with Interni, Coam (Colegio Oficial de Arquitectos de Madrid) and di_mad (Asociación de Diseñadores de Madrid), with the aim of supporting the value of Italian design in Spain and spreading it in universities, design schools and among young professionals.

Invented for the occasion of Italian Design Day 2018, the contest was launched in Madrid on 4 October during the Semana de la Arquitectura.

Schools taking part included Elisava (Barcelona), Esne-Escuela Universitaria de Diseño, Innovación y Tecnología (Madrid), IED Barcelona, IED Madrid, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (Madrid), alongside young professionals under 35, and for the making of the prototypes of the winning projects the companies Ethimo, Ghidini 1961 and Officine Tamborrino.

On 13 December 2018 the jury chaired by the ambassador Stefano Sannino and composed of Gilda Bojardi, editor of Interni, Luciano Galimberti, president of ADI, Marva Griffin, founder and curator of the Salone Satellite, Maria Güell, light designer, Carlos Lahoz, vice-president of COAM, and Mariano Martín, secretary of di_mad, met at the Arnoldo Mondadori building in Segrate (MI) to select eleven finalists.

The three winning projects were Loop Kitchen, a monoblock kitchen by Jesús López de los Mozos (Officine Tamborrino), Buffet Capa by Manuel García Fraile (Ethimo) and Ness, a modular trivet by students from IED Madrid, Cristina Castillo and Patricia Lallana (Ghidini 1961).

There were also eight honorable mentions.

The exhibition created by the architect Davide Valoppi (Noarc Studio) in the South Loggia of the Cortile d’Onore presents the models of the three winning projects and drawings and renderings of the eight honorable mentions.

The Meet Lab

BraIN Taiwan

“To tell the world, for the first time in a complete way, about the capacity for design and innovation in textile manufacturing in Taiwan,” formed by small family businesses and large industrial groups that invest sizeable resources in research and development to create innovation, wealth and health.

This is the mission of BraIN Taiwan, the installation that takes visitors on a voyage between Portico Richini and Portico San Nazaro, staged by the Italo-Taiwanese artistic collective The Meet Lab (curators Louis Ma, Giampaolo Galenda, Elena Gemelli and designers Beatrice Arenella, Andrea Bonessa, Nicola Brembilla, Lorenzo Palmeri), commissioned by the government of the city of Tainan and the Department for Industrial Development and the Ministry of Economic Affairs of Taiwan.

The exhibition is divided into eight project areas, presenting fabrics in graphene, the thinnest material in the world, with good properties of thermal conduction, produced by Everest Textile, or the products of Eysan, moisturizing thanks to collagen gathered from scrap from the processing of fish, which prevent irritation, are pleasant to the touch and have the ability to break up odor molecules.

The ultralight AirySektor membrane by BenQ Materials can be applied to any type of synthetic or natural fiber, and represents a true revolution in the sector of breathing, non-toxic waterproof fabrics.

Dario Curatolo

The Door of Dreamers

The project by Dario Curatolo represents a sort of ‘degree zero’ of the space of mankind: the sky, the earth, the individual.

The earth is depicted by a ‘pour’ of material, substantial, dense, which from the steps expands into the area in front of the portal, made with sheets of volcanic stone by Nerosicilia.

The sky is composed of thousands of stars, tiny tiles produced by Mosaicomicro by recycling glass from computer monitors and discarded television sets: small fragments in different hues, atoms that construct the sky but also the roof, the shelter, the refuge.

The presence of many is symbolized by two large partitions in gray lava stone, almost a cavern whose walls bear signs, words, codes, screen-printed on glass, which like cave paintings bear witness to the evolution of the human race.

The partitions also trigger a perspective effect, as in the work of Borromini, leading towards a door of light: a luminous curtain that divides the space, symbolizing the vision of the future, impalpable, imminent.

A future familiar to dreamers, those who attempt to design tomorrow with sensitivity and awareness, because the space of mankind is fragile.

On the installation designed by Dario Curatolo, the Scalone d’Onore takes on a second skin, on an inclined structure that creates an illusion of perspective.

Nerosicilia has supplied the volcanic stone (laNera) that covers the steps, and the gray slabs (enneUno), enhanced by screen-printed words and drawings for the walls.

Claudio Larcher and Astrid Luglio

Oblique World

To observe the world of sparkling wines through the lens of a dynamic experiential setting, where slope is simply a question of perception.

The visual experimentation of the installation by Claudio Larcher and Astrid Luglio with a selected group of students at Naba interprets the natural value of a steep hillside, as in the region of Valdobbiadene, in the Veneto, where grapes are grown and harvested by hand to make Mionetto Prosecco.

Oblique World is composedf ten artifacts in delicate blown borosilicate glass, placed vertically on an oblique plane, and obliquely on a horizontal plane.

Five are displayed in structures with an angle of 27 degrees, while the other five are presented on a horizontal shelf, so the objects themselves, rather than the surface, appear to be oblique.

The colored sloping structures, each two meters in length, are made in metal rod, while the horizontal structure is in metal. The space framed by a series of colored panels stands out for its clean geometric lines, emphasized by the chromatic range in tones of black, orange and white.

An installation produced in collaboration with Mionetto, on the landscape of Valdobbiadene and the world of sparkling wines.

Astrid Luglio and Claudio Larcher, with a group of student from NABA – Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti, have created 10 artifacts in blown borosilicate glass, which seem vertical when placed on an oblique surface, and oblique when placed on a horizontal surface, interpreting the steep slopes of the hills where Mionetto Prosecco is made.

Marco Merendi

Leonardo in the Greenhouse

The installation by Marco Merendi is a pure, essential container for the faithful reproduction of the reading stand touched by the Virgin in the painting of the Annunciation by Leonardo da Vinci at the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence.

A stand made in solid arolla pine, carved by hand by the master craftsman Roberto Giovannini.

The greenhouse designed by Arcadia is a transparent architectural structure, light and impalpable, that protects without covering.

It wraps the reading stand like a cloak of light that retains reflections and colors, unveiling a world, connecting earth and sky, human and divine.

Inside, thanks to the application of dichroic films on the glass, the setting generates the play of transparencies, lights, shadows.

The flow of time across the day alters the perception of the reading desk at the center of the greenhouse, in a kaleidoscope of colors and shapes that change depending on the vantage point.

Chiara Andreatti

Design Vibrations

A theatrical optical totem that projects luminous vibrations, capturing the gaze of visitors.

This is the idea of Chiara Andreatti to transform the North Portal of the Università degli Studi di Milano.

The installation narrates the design commitment of Izipizi, the Parisian brand of prêt-à-porter eyewear.

“ I have interpreted the architectural element of the arch as a folder/archive, The repetition of the eyeglasses and neon tubes is the focal point of the project, which gives rise to a sea of lights with a contemporary spirit. The portal is seen as the entrance to a newly generated world: the glasses, selected in the tortoise shell texture and in different tones, stand out against the luminous backdrop; their materials and colors are lighted, creating games of transparency and material character.”

A setting of great aesthetic and graphic impact that interprets the sophisticated but essential style of the Parisian brand. A space of passage becomes a place of interaction for visitors, invited to take selfies and to share them on the social networks, spreading the positive vibrations and iconic design of Izipizi.

To compete the installation, an exhibition inside the Moroni Gomma on Corso Matteotti, presents the photographic works of Gianluca Vassallo, showing various protagonists of the world of design wearing the Izipizi eyewear collections.

The concept is that of a sea of lights in an optical version: a composition of over 300 eyeglasses by Izipizi, alternating with neon lights, frames the arch of the North Portal.

The result has an evocative pop flavor: the lights play with the materic effects of the eyewear, especially the transparencies and yellow tones of the Tortoise models.

Andrea Maffei

Opening

Reinforced concrete has transformed the way we build and live in architecture, cities, new urban landscapes.

At the same time, it has modified the mentality of people, who see it not only as a cold and gray material, but also as something living and vibrant.

The material effect of Dot porcelain stoneware by Fioranese, which reproduce the texture of concrete with patched holes like those caused by the stripping of formwork (in the triangular format they reinterpret the classic form of the rectangular shutters), covers the three accesses to the hall of the Aula Magna designed by Andrea Maffei.

The result is a true concrete ‘wall’ cut vertically and dynamically opened in front of each entrance, with three large gates rotated by 30 degrees, like an invitation to enter. The spaces created in the three portals leave the cornices, pilasters and capitals of the old doors visible, establishing a dynamic relationship between antique marble and modern concrete.

A dialogue between old and new in the active flow of crossing from the outdoor setting of the cloister to the indoor spaces of the building

The Dot collection by Fioranese, in porcelain stoneware, designed by the architect Andrea Maffei, reflects the contemporary modernity of concrete.

For Human Spaces, the designer has used Dot to create the partitions placed over the accesses to the Hall of the Aula Magna.

Marcio Kogan + Filippo Bricolo

Speaks

Probably there is no human space more intense than the one around the living microcosm of a table, an object that has always been a symbol of enjoyment and socializing, in both Italian and Brazilian culture.

With the Parla! table the Italian architect Filippo Bricolo and Marcio Kogan, founder of the Brazilian design studio MK27, do not present a simple piece of design furniture, but have formulated an imperative, a way of urging people to create a new convivium, offering visitors the possibility of a shared experience.

“A way to summon errant spirits, an appeal to those who still want to dream, but no longer find the space in which to do it.”

With a length of 10 meters, the table in fine Statuarietto marble, made thanks to the production prowess of the Furrer brand of Carrara, offers a visionary and real scenario: a symposium in which to find yourself through the fundamental and founding act of sharing.

A space for reflection and dialogue that combines two of the loftiest manifestations of civilization: speech and food.

An installation and an iconic object, the quintessence of convivial pleasure.

Parla! is not just a table, but a way of urging people to share food and thoughts.

Fabio Novembre

Once Upon a Time

“ I have decided to write a new fable in which a long bed allows the good guys and bad guys of all the stories in the world to gather, mingle and finally destroy the barriers of orthodox dualism that frighten me more and more these days.

The contours of things are much blurrier than we might think… like the size of a bed, for example. Sweet dreams!” ……..  Fabio Novembre,

Novembre fathomed the world of fable to create a red bed with a length of 21 meters that encourages visitors to linger and to share spaces, moments, thoughts, soothed by classical music and the view of the arches of the historic Loggiato Ovest.

An immersive and multisensory experience in which red is the main color (setting the mood).

A luminous inscription hovers over the installation that forms a relationship with the entire Cortile d’Onore, being visible from various points.

The unusual off-scale bed is framed by six illustrations from the collection “Una Fiaba PerDormire” by Fabio Novembre: beds with evocative names (Castle, Princess, Dress, Cloud…) narrate little stories, hinting at an enchanted world.

A bed with a length of 21 meters, 1.8 meters wide, invites visitors to approach and relax.

“Once upon a time” is the luminous message made with LED tubes over the installation with its accent on restful slumber.

Ludovica Diligu

Maxi Shirts in Resin

Ludovica Diligu, designer and founder of Labo.Art, a fashion brand, interprets the Human Spaces theme making a wooden display case whose objective is to remind us of memorabilia collections.

This project features 5 maxi shirts flattened and resin coated, represented in various hues of blue, tones used to show the passing of time over a day, from dawn to sunset.

“The shirt” – says Ludovica – “abandons its traditional use as a garment to be worn and turns into an installation that leads to thinking about the flow of life and of time”.

5 maxi shirts flattened and resin coated, represented in various hues of blue

Milgiore + Servetto Architects

To Live in the Country

Located in the Hall of the Aula Magna, the installation by Migliore + Servetto Architects conveys and communicates the fundamental values of the activities of the National Council of Architects, Planners, Landscape Designers and Conservators (CNAPPC), the public agency reporting to the Ministry of Justice which through the initiative Abitare il Paese sets out to promote the enactment of public policies for the city and a national program of urban regeneration.

The installation is based on two levels of content corresponding to two different planes of environmental narrative, transforming an area of passage into a place to spend time, full of identity.

The first value is connection, interpreted in terms of engagement: a dense network of suspended and interwoven elements that establish a dialogue with light and space, creating a scenario of attraction.

The project physically and conceptually sums up the network of relations that CNAPPC builds to involve a wider public, raising awareness of the close correlation between design quality and environmental quality.

The second value is sharing, represented by the table – the worktable of the architect – around which to create a fertile place of exchange, inclusion and debate, a place to design spaces for the future but also to develop the sense of belonging to a community.

The network of connections CNAPPC (Consiglio Nazionale degli Architetti, Pianificatori, Paesaggisti e Conservatori) represents is interpreted by a dense composition of cables and luminous newspapers on the walls that invades and ‘connects’ the Hall of the Aula Magna.

Below this weave, a system of tables of different heights extends for a length of about 21 meters; the reference is the worktable of the designer, seen as a place of encounter, exchange of ideas and sharing.

Mac Stopa

Human Rooms

For the info point and press room, the two places of transit and gathering that represent the calling card of Interni at the Università degli Studi di Milano, Mac Stopa / Massive Design has imagined a composition with a cubist matrix that artistically reworks an iconographic vocabulary of forms and materials, summing it up in a voyage of perceptive vibrations inspired by the colors of nature.

All the walls are painted with an ecological range of pastel tones by Boero, with cool tones in the reception zone and warm ones in the adjacent area set aside for the press.

The floor features a geometric pattern of carpet squares by Tarkett.

By contrast, hundreds of cans, painted with warm colors in the ‘cool’ room and cool colors in the ‘warm’ room bring dynamism to the chromatic temperatures of the spaces.

These circular geometries are the figures that stand out against the backdrop of the 3D puzzle that completes the furnishings of True Design, with lights – fundamental to bring the setting to life – by Targetti.

Other Courtyards around the University

Humberto Campana

Sleeping Piles

The installation suggests a dialogue between the organic lines of nature and the curves of architecture, creating a harmonious symbiosis of landscape, time and space. Sleeping Piles encourages visitors to relax, leaving the chaos of the city and contemporary life behind them.

The project takes its cue from the colonnade of the Cortile della Farmacia: at the center stand seven towers with a height of five meters, covered with grass and producing a reverse image of the architectural curves of the arches.

The work of the Campana brothers stands out for a remarkable ability to transform and reinvent.

To grant precious value to humble, everyday or common materials is a very Brazilian attitude found in their design: colors, creative chaos, the triumph of simple solutions.

Sleeping Piles has been produced with Apex Brasil, the Brazilian Agency for the Promotion of Trade and Investment, which at the Museo della Permanente presents Brazil: Essentially Diverse, a multisensory exhibition that narrates the unique character of Brazilian material culture, focusing on its roots and its potential for transformation.

Luigi Spedini

Mirages

Luigi Spedini establishes a dialogue with the history of the Cortile dei Bagni and its central pools, built starting from the 18th century.

Mirages is a dreamy work that suggests the sensation triggered by two extraordinary elements: light and water.

Produced by Piscine Laghetto, a worldwide leader in the sector of above-ground pools, with design by Luigi Spedini and Rosalba Carollo, the project provides two areas of wellness and relaxation around two small pools: Playa Living and Dolcevita Divina.

All around, bamboo canes stand as a symbol of rectitude, elevation and purity. But this regenerating space reaches its maximum theatrical impact at night, thanks to the lighting design by Davide Groppi.

A light experience that invades the entire courtyard.

“ I thought about the idea that the true color of light is blue, like the sky, like water.”

The space is flooded with an intense blue in which to plunge, like a great ablution, between earth and sky. The central pools of the courtyard are filled with colored light, rising to the upper porticos: the waterways and sky of Milan come together in a grand dream.

The pools represent the lakes of Lombardy, with bamboo canes growing on the shores. Finally, a moon lamp reminds us of our human essence. ”  ………… Davide Groppi.

The installation in the Cortile dei Bagni focuses on wellness and the relationship between man and two primary elements, water and light.

Mirages, produced by Piscine Laghetto, features two mini-pools, Playa Living (400×300 cm) and Dolcevita Divina (280×580 cm), with LED spotlights.

Piero Lissoni

From Shipyard to Courtyard

“As if the sea had dried up, the profile of a yacht is left peacefully lying in the Cortile del ‘700 of the University, like a creature of which we know only the skeleton, narrating an original purity.”

This is how Piero Lissoni explains “From shipyard to courtyard,” the striking installation at the center of the courtyard. With a length of 33 meters, the evocative work is made in red painted wood, the typical color of the paint applied to the keels of boats for protection.

With an evident reference to the wooden structures made by shipwrights, Piero Lissoni reinterprets the hull of a SX112 Sanlorenzo yacht in an abstract way, making it become a symbol of the company itself, revealing its experience, craftsmanship and innovative approach.

The hull, which represents the initial phase in the making of a yacht, narrates the mastery of the artisans who have always shaped these sophisticated artifacts, and previews a new model that will be presented in 2020.

The interior design by Piero Lissoni for the flagship SX112, protagonist of the installation, totally reinterprets the on-board space: an unusual open-plan area, with a seamless indoor-outdoor interface: a “social boat.”

At the center of the Cortile del ‘700, the majestic profile of a boat in actual size (33 meters in length, 8 in width) reinterprets the hull of a SX112 yacht by Sanlorenzo.

Nicoletta Vallorani

Urban Island Space for Students

In a choral combination of voices and experiences of the students of the State University, the installations of Urban Islands.

Spaces for Students represent a multifaceted sequence of interpretations of already familiar, experienced, imagined but also endured spaces.

Ambivalent spaces, capable of opening to participation or closing, in isolation.

Hosted in the Cortile della Ghiacciaia – whose glass dome will be lit from below with an intermittent beam, representing the beating heart of the University – the works are organized in two thematic clusters: emotional spaces and spaces of isolation.

The first grouping includes Immersive Spaces, multimedia narratives based on texts by a group of students to explore through special visors, and the Emotional Maps, projections that establish a dialogue with paper maps sketched on the historic architecture of the courtyard to redesign a familiar but seldom represented topography.

These ideally open places are contrasted by others whose dimension is that of the ‘non-chosen’ space, which nevertheless seeks (and finds) a way of being overcome by sharing: the Spaces of Care, of the Youth Project of the National Cancer Institute, and “La Statale al Bekka,” a narrative of closed areas that reopen in the creative encounter between the young inhabitants of the Istituto Penale Minorile Cesare Beccaria, a juvenile detention center, and the students of the State University.

Other City Locations

Orto Botanico di Brera

Carlo Ratti

The Circular Garden

Is it possible to create a work of architecture that comes from the earth and returns there in a circular way?

This is the challenge met by Carlo Ratti Associati, which has created an installation for Eni on view at the Orto Botanico di Brera.

The work takes its cue from the symbolism of the medieval hortus conclusus: a circumscribed space where nature returns to its original balance.

The project experiments with the use of an organic material, mycelium, or the fibrous roots of fungi.

With a particular procedure, this substance gives rise to elastic, strong structural parts that can be used to create monolithic arches, with a height of four meters, scattered throughout the garden.

With this project ENI sets out to illustrate its innovations in the field of the circular economy, which through recycling and reuse of raw materials represents a way of getting beyond the old linear model based on intensive exploitation of resources, accumulation of waste and production of harmful emissions.

The circular garden,’ was grown over the six weeks — and will be returned to the soil at the end of the month.

Each of the four structures is composed of a sequence of arches, that together comprise one kilometer of mycelium.

The project experiments with sustainable structures that can grow organically and then return to nature in a fully circular way.

At the end of the event the structures will be dismantled, crushed and returned to the ground: they can become fertilizer, initiating another growth cycle.

Educational workshops are held inside the structures to illustrate the innovations Eni in the field of the circular economy to visitors, along with digital and multimedia content.

The focus is on concrete initiatives, like the production of bio-fuels derived from organic materials and refuse, the gathering and reuse of waste materials like vegetable oils used for frying, the recovery and improvement of abandoned industrial areas.

Arco della Pace

Hani Rashid + Lisa Anne Couture

E Domesticity

The combined effects of electric mobility and artificial intelligence will have a major impact on our ways of getting around, travelling and interacting with the urban environment.

Hani Rashid, co-founder with Lise Anne Couture of the firm Asymptote Architecture based in New York, looks forward to these future scenarios, designing a recharging station for electric vehicles at Arco della Pace, a place in which to activate new dynamics of social contact and exchange.

Developed and produced in collaboration with Audi, the project comes from an awareness of the state of isolation caused by digital living and our growing reliance on screens.

The installation, whose circular modular design is based on the architecture of Arco della Pace and the four rings of the Audi logo, formulates a new type of urban space, a place of physical and spatial interaction, at which to recharge your car but also to relax and move, to realign our existences and relations with the values of time and the environment.

The e-station by Asymptote will host the new Audi e-tron, the brand’s first zero-emission car, forerunner of an original range of products that will contain 12 completely electric vehicles by 2025; at the same time, it will present events, encounters and performances.

In the Caselli Daziari (the former customs lodges), the automaker from Ingolstadt organizes the seventh edition of Audi City Lab, a hub of discussion and analysis of mobility trends for the future.

In collaboration with Audi, the installation is composed of large rings of steel joined by cylindrical parts of variable diameter, also in steel.

The latter are finished with a metallized silver coating with different gloss levels; they have the job of consolidating and defining the temporary architectural structure, accessed from various points by means of steps and ramps to permit circulation of people, car prototypes and electric models.

Torre Velasca

Ingo Maurer and Axel Schmid

Dip into the Blue

After the experience in 2016, when for the event Open Borders Ingo Maurer and Alex Schmid lit up the Torre Velasca in red with the installation Glow, Velasca, Glow!, the two designers are back at one of Milan’s landmark buildings, making it a reference point for the city.

Today the work by Maurer and Schmid, Nel blu, dip into di blu, makes the tower glow with a mystical, deep blue.

The initiative is part of the exhibition organized by Interni, Human Spaces, and is made in collaboration with Urban Up – Unipol Projects Cities, the project of Gruppo Unipol of real estate regeneration, bringing out the value of some of the most important examples of Italian architecture.

To enhance the effect, beams of white light will project the geometric form of the architecture skyward, like a ‘crown’ at the tower’s summit.

These vertical ‘decorations’ suggest an ideal link to the nearby cathedral and its spires.

The technical lighting project for Torre Velasca has been done by CastagnaRavelli