Milan Design Week: 'Decadence is an end in itself'
MILAN (AP) — The way things are going, most people would like a crystal ball to see the future.
Donatella Versace has another idea: crystal for relaxation. Her crystal forms the core of a chaise lounge — a three-tiered curving formation — white leather on luminescent crystal on metal — that invites you to laze on a white cushion. This crystal is not for foretelling but for relaxation.
"You need to have a place to relax and be yourself. Crystal is very spiritual, that's why we chose it," Versace said at the midtown Milan Versace Theater where the fashion house presented the 'Ninfa' chaise-lounge as the centerpiece of its Versace Home 2009 collection on opening day of the Milan Design Week on Wednesday.
The annual international furniture show is the most important appointment of the year for designers of furniture, kitchens and household objects to showcase their new collections. Events spill over from the capacious Milan Convention Center in Rho just outside of the city into boutiques, theaters and showrooms throughout Milan that make the weeklong fair, running until April 27, a design street fair of the highest order.
Versace may have been the first of the big fashion houses to enter the home furnishings business — but it wasn't the last.
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Giorgio Armani presented a "disappearing kitchen," named Calyx and developed with Dada — their second collaboration.
The work area can be concealed behind wide doors to create "a discreet environment" of floor-to-ceiling doors that give the appearance of walls in an elegant satin finish giving an impression of gold. A matching square dining table that seats eight can easily be flipped from a black stone top, to the same finish as the walls: elegant uniformity.
Once opened, a fully functional kitchen is revealed: refrigerator, freezers, dishwasher, steam and standard ovens, food warming drawer, gas stove and wine cellar — with ample storage space. All of the interior cabinetry is clad with plain silver colored techno fabric — sticking close to Armani's fashion roots — covered with glass panels.
Armani also introduced a series of limited, signed articles for his Armani/Casa collection.
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Their names describe anyone's reaction to a pair of lamps, or better yet, illuminated sculpture, that bring together in an extraordinary collaboration the creative power of Phillipe Starke, conceptual artist Jenny Holzer and Baccarat crystal: Haaa!!! and Hooo!!!
The lamps designed by Starke are sure to gain cult art status with the rolling electronic texts encased in Baccarat crystal written by Holzer — some 30 in all — including the apropos "decadence can be an end in itself," as well as "dreaming while awake is a frightening contradiction," and "wishing things away is not effective."
The texts themselves become somewhat obscured both by their motion and by the cut of the crystal — giving the feel of electronic energy pulsing through the long elegant base. They are produced by the Italian design firm Flos.
Haaa!!! is the commanding floor lamp nearly 6 feet high on Baccarat's elegantly cut crystal base with the electronic innards concealed in a mirrored panel in the back. Hooo!! is a smaller version of the same. Both are in limited editions, with the Haaa!!! selling for nearly $120,000 (euro90,000) and the Hooo!!! for nearly $10,000 (euro9,000).
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Nature, whimsy and practical elegance belong to three new sofas designed by New York-based Gaetano Pesce for Meritalia.
"Montanara," an ensemble of seats and armrests, brings nature to your living room — with seat backs shaped like craggy mountain peaks and the seats themselves bearing images of pools of water spilling over the side. Pesce said in notes that he wanted to convey the idea "that nature is a dear and wonderful companion that we have to treat with love."
No one who passed Pesce's series of seats called "Friends" could resist sitting in the midst of his whimsical mix of animals — "the humbler kind," as the designer put it — including toucans, fish, sheep and pigs. And many who allowed themselves to be enveloped in these "gentler, nonviolent" friends could not resist a squeal of joy.
The series takes its name "Friends" from Pesce's childhood memories, when the animals in his dreams towered above the boy.
"Colorado" is perhaps the most commercial of Pesce's Milan Design Week premieres — an elegant sofa comprised of monochrome sections in vivid green, yellow, purple, black and brown shaped to conjure images of Rocky Mountain peaks against the blue, red or black backdrop of the seats. The mountain tops can be easily moved around to allow maximum customization and flexibility, even on the spur of the moment.
Colorado's "joyful and inviting" nature is sure to find a market, Pesce wrote.
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Designer Samuele Mazza has made a critical, yet so-far overlooked, link between element (water) and material (mother of pearl) in his spa tub clad in the iridescent inner layer of a mollusk shell — allowing bathers to luxuriate in swirling waters while basking in a product of the sea.
Two young women dressed as modern mermaids perched on the tub's side during an opening cocktail party Thursday evening attended by more than 4,000 fashionistas in the central Milan theater that has been converted into a showroom for the Visionnaire Design Gallery, of which Mazza is the creative director.
"It is super luxury, yes. In any case, it is not impossible luxury. It costs as much as a little car. You might choose a little car, or a tub that you can relax in every day," said Mazza.
There's no question that the super wealthy are Mazza's target: The mother-of-pearl-clad tub is envisioned for a future seven-star hotel that he is in talks with developers to realize. But not only.
"The idea of the hotel is that everyone can be rich for at least one night," Mazza said. "It is not just a place to sleep, but something more. It can entertain you. It doesn't matter where you are, you don't need to go see the Colosseum in Rome or the Leaning Tower in Pisa."
Mazza likened his concept to a sort of design tourism that has driven visitors to places like Bilbao, Spain, for the Guggenheim Museum, and Dubai, where a construction craze has drawn tourists.
A sustainable note: The mother of pearl itself is the product of an Italian company that ensures that for every mother of pearl it uses, another 12 are raised.
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Speaking of sustainability, CLASS — an Italian firm that promotes environmentally better products for fashion, home and design — was out to remind people that luxury can be good for the environment, too.
At its Sparkling boutique, it presented interior design fabrics made from bamboo, milk fiber and other renewable and organic solutions, demonstrating that preserving the planet doesn't have to be a dowdy affair. CLASS also showed a Flybook V5 laptop computer clad in mother of pearl and a chair of recycled paper.
"We are trying to bring out the sustainable world, slowly, so people see the possibility for renewability — especially in this period where everything is stalled," CLASS co-founder Giusi Bettoni said.