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Sustainable Design: Highlights from Milan Design Week 2023

The best of Milan Design Week 2023: from sustainable materials to artificial intelligence, discover our selection of top trends and Design news.

The Intersection of Technology and Sustainable Design: Showcasing the Best of Milan Design Week 2023

Milan Design Week has been a platform for innovation and creativity in the design industry, bringing together designers, brands, and enthusiasts to celebrate the power of design. The 2023 edition reflected a change in the Design, influenced by Artificial Intelligence and Sustainability. With no more pandemic restrictions, the event spread freely around the city of Milano, showcasing the latest trends and ideas from around the world.

What we love in this edition of the Milan Design Week: from young designers to fashion brands, many are focused on creating environmentally friendly products and using sustainable materials in their creations with some help from AI.

7 Highlights and Trends from Milan Design Week 2023 that we love

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“Design for Good” exhibition

Eco design is becoming more prevalent and sophisticated than ever before, and at Milan Design Week we can see just that. At the 5VIE Network gallery, the exhibition called “Design for Good” explores deep human connections and sustainability through a series of installments in collaboration with international curators, artists, and designers. The sustainable design projects celebrate and re-imagine the future of Emirati crafts, materials, and food culture, with ‘echoes of alchemy’. The show, co-created by Mr. Lawrence and civil architecture, bred a series of food recipes and dinner experiences by @casalingheditokyo, tailored with food instruments by Studio Pepe and ICC designers.

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Nike shoes Design by AI of sustainable ideas

At the Spanificio, Nike exhibition turned a former bakery into a production line that explores sustainable footwear design. For the visitors in Milano Design Week, Nike created an exhibition about the life cycle of Nike footwear, from using sustainable materials like algae ink glue through to fully recyclable components. One of the special shoes that reflect this idea is ISPA Universa where Nike enhances artificial intelligence to digital mashup of four historic and iconic footwear silhouettes. The creations use AI to explore new form vocabularies. Made from Bio-EVA foam derived from sugarcane, the footwear are injection molded, then hand-buffed, and feature replaceable components to extend its life, including cork insoles.

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Design for Metaverse by JCP Universe

Yes, Metaverses are a new upcoming market for Furniture and Interior Design. JCP Universe returned to Milan Design Week with ‘meta-physical’, an uncommon installation celebrating its expansion into the virtual world through the construction of its first owned metaverse. Visitors could interact with this world using VR visors, discovering super terrestrial landscapes and unknown life forms, while rediscovering some furniture pieces in the form of NFTs and seeing them come to life. If you didn’t visit the exhibition in the theater Arsenale, you can still visit it in the comfort of your own home here!

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Sustainability in 3D print for commercial furniture

The New Raw is a young studio design based in Rotterdam (Netherlands) founded by the architects Panos Sakkas and Foteini Setaki. In Alcova Milano, they performed an itinerant platform for independent design with the ‘knotty’ 3D print benches. The studio reveals for the first time a collection of playful benches with a bold and tactile texture. The architects treat plastic waste as a continuous thread of material that folds, twists and loops to create surfaces that resemble textiles.

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Mexican culture inspires Sustainable Furniture in Milan Design Week

In Isola Design Gallery, the most international emerging designers and independent design studios were present. But “Ventura” by Joyful Objects, Yes! is a cabinet whose extraordinary aesthetic follows criteria out of ordinary and serious design. The young design studio based in Mexico city, evokes Mexican culture and represents the studio’s interest in designing amusing and singular pieces. Without ever foregoing harmony, Joyful Objects, Yes! are pieces on which the rattan element perfectly complements the wood bases.

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Loewe fashion brand with sustainable Chairs

The luxury fashion brand Loewe has made a quiet but significant foray into the world of homeware, building on their reputation for craftsmanship and their interest in human invention as a progressive tool. The Loewe Chairs exhibition presented in Palazzo Isimbardi featured handcrafted chairs reimagined by artisans through the act of weaving and embellishment. Antique and newly crafted stick chairs and paper loom chairs are woven with leather, raffia or metallic fibers, transforming everyday objects into one of a kind items.

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Ikea celebrates 80 years

In Via Tortona, one of Milan’s most vibrant design districts, Ikea celebrated 80 years of Design creation. #IKEA opened the historic building’s doors of the Padiglione Visconti to welcome visitors for a week of design, talks, music, food, and of course a peep through the company’s most iconic products through time.

Milan Design Week 2023 has given us a glimpse into the future of design, with sustainable materials, craftsmanship, technology and AI. It was clear that Design plays an important role in shaping our environment and our experiences. And we hope this multisensory journey will be more than a show and is a trend to stay.

DAM Portugal

Sustainable furniture and accessories