Spring is a time of renewal. That sentiment rings truest in the world of furniture design, as international festivals present the latest collections that will shape our interior worlds. The biggest of them all, Milan Design Week — and its centrepiece fair, Salone del Mobile — kicks off the season. And so it also begins our exploration of the trends that we predict will hold sway over the next year. From a sensitive approach to minimalism (see Faye Toogood’s porcelain series for Noritake) to expressive forms (like Bethan Laura Wood’s Baccarat chandelier), a plurality of sensibilities emerges. These introductions are just a taste of what to expect in Milan — stay tuned for more as we cover the fair on the ground, during and after the festivities.

Collectible Delights

Salone del Mobile adds eye-popping attractions to the fair — including Salone Raritas, a way to engage lovers of collectible design more often seen off-site. We spoke to curator Annalisa Rosso about what’s in store at the Formafantasma-designed exhibition.

Why introduce these categories to Salone?

AR: After years of trying to all be the same — I remember travelling to a hotel and not being able to tell if I was in New York or New Delhi — now, everybody in the industry is looking for individual identity. Increasingly, we are receiving requests for special pieces, something that can add value to a project both economically and culturally.

How do you see Raritas connecting to the fair’s commercial exhibitors?

It’s a new layer in our ecosystem. Of the almost 2,000 brands exhibiting at Salone, many are already working in the collectible sector — brands are developing limited editions or working with designs from their archives. Sabine Marcelis, for instance, does commercial work too, but she described her work in the collectible sector as a space of freedom.

How will Raritas compare to Milan’s collectible design galleries?

Nina Yashar, the founder of Nilufar gallery, has two of the most beautiful spaces in town, but she said that she wants to be in Raritas. It’s clear that the visitors to these destinations are not the same, or the purpose of their visit is not the same. The fair is a business-oriented visit, so it allows exhibitors to hit their proper target in an effective way.

What are some of the designs you’re excited to have on display?

Our 25 exhibitors are responding to the entire variety of visitors to Salone from all over the world. In Italy, the Murano glassworks company Salviati has created pieces with Draga & Aurel, and it’s nice to see this incredible tradition interpreted with their bold vision.

Kitchen Vision

At the biennial kitchen exhibition EuroCucina, Scavolini shows off Flair, a collection that includes elegantly contoured systems for the kitchen, bathroom and living room. Characterized by convex and concave units, the series exudes a soft curviness in line with the trend of crafting interiors with round-edged volumes. Flair’s surfaces come in matte and glossy lacquered finishes as well as natural wood veneers.

Minimal Moments

These debuts during Milan Design Week hint at a return to rigorous, stripped-down forms — with much inspiration from craft tradition

TEA TIME Purity of form lies at the heart of Kiln, Faye Toogood’s second collection for Japanese brand Noritake. Coming on the heels of last year’s Rose series, Kiln serves up more restraint in a design language that’s both tranquil and delightfully bulbous. Drawing from her experiences at the company’s Nagoya headquarters, Toogood has created chimney-inspired porcelain vessels — including a tea and coffee pot, a milk jug and a sugar and candy bowl — in black Seto glaze, classic Noritake white, and the pale blue Seihakuji hue. Where there are surface patterns, they appear as the botanical motifs of Toogood’s artwork Pond, “a poetic composition referencing the company’s public garden and Japanese folklore, where frogs symbolize fortune and prosperity.” A collection this wonderfully resolved deserves its very own tea ritual.

Inspired by Japanese joinery, Hirsch Bedner Associates designed the Kumiki chair for Giorgetti in solid Canaletto walnut with a choice of finishes.

When its three tiers are pulled away, Pagoda, a coffee table by David Lopez Quincoces for Living Divani, makes for a modern interpretation of the traditional architectural typology.

Solid wood is both the structural material and sculpted surface of the Core cabinet. Developed by Hannes Peer with SEM founder Claudio Spotti, the unique piece celebrates bas relief as a defining element.

Studio Klass debuts a table for MDF Italia that “balances technical sophistication with conceptual depth.” Its striking base feels both minimal and organic, like spiders’ legs.

Romantic Gestures

Curves and colour, however, are not going anywhere. From the palazzo to the living room parlour, a love for softness and sensuality endures

PINK PARTY MoscaPartners continues its tradition of taking over Palazzo Litta’s courtyard with an installation that delivers both spectacle and soul. This year’s site-specific work, Metamorphosis in Motion, arrives courtesy of Paris-based Lebanese architect Lina Ghotmeh. Here, she fills the courtyard with a labyrinthine arrangement of rosy pink partitions designed to orchestrate movement and interaction, bringing contemporary spark to a traditional setting and shifting the square’s role “from threshold to commons.” Mind you, while it may now serve as a destination unto itself, the reimagined courtyard still acts as a gateway, too: Its evolutionary theme carries throughout the surrounding building’s halls, where more than a dozen exhibitors will contribute their own ideas about “radical and necessary transformation.”

Cassina reimagines a 1980 concept by the late Gaetano Pesce as sinuous outdoor seating, created in flexible polyurethane foam coated with a thin elastomeric layer. Dubbed Dalila, the chair is offered in two versions — one with armrests and one without — and takes inspiration from the parable of Samson and Delilah. (Hair not included.)

Cattelan Italia caters to fluid, open floor plans with a curvy new configuration of its Craig sofa, reimagined to hold court in the centre of a room. The design preserves the strong, enveloping armrests that give the rest of the Craig system its signature character.

As part of its 90th anniversary celebrations this year, Bonaldo introduces the Amour armchair by Fabrice Berrux. The seat’s shell-like form features precisely engineered curves designed to deliver ergonomic comfort — and an alluring silhouette.

Profili, shown, is one of 12 rugs in a theatrical new collection from Fornasetti and cc-tapis, who approached each design like an act in a play. 

Belgian designer Bieke Casteleyn built her latest furniture introductions around a fun clover shape.

Established & Sons tapped Italy’s Carlo Nason to develop Medusa, a jellyfish-inspired light that layers several mouth-blown opaline glass diffusers.

Formal Experiments

Because every room could use an eye-catching outlier

EVEN IF WE’RE MOVING AWAY from creating Instagrammable interiors in favour of orchestrating more lived-in spaces, look-at-me furnishings, fixtures and accessories are still sought-after for their ability to elevate each room in the home, providing a timeless focal point. And there are always a number of debuts during Milan Design Week that are singular, that stay with you. These featured designs might just be among them: They celebrate iconic geometries, luxurious details and indelible forms — for everywhere from the bathroom to the living room.

Antonio Lupi always generates buzz with its marvellous bathroom fixtures. Skyline, designed for the brand by Antonio Iraci, is a freestanding marble washbasin with boldly intersecting planes.

Shown at Dilmos gallery, Onno Adriaanse’s Hedera cabinet, crafted in walnut, was inspired by the way climbing plants “symbiotically intertwine with trees.” Its organic-seeming structure and handles provide a soft counterpoint to its straight lines.

The 10th anniversary of the Dutch collective exhibition “Masterly” is certain to be a knockout. It will include Etcetera’s Septa chair, a dreamy 3D-printed rocking chair made from recycled plastics.

Sometimes, the entire living room is a showpiece. Julian is a new sofa series for Molteni&C by Vincent Van Duysen; the brand and the designer are celebrating a decade of working together.

Kelly Wearstler’s H&M Home collection will likely sell out fast. The pieces, which include the Curva vase, play with silhouettes in intriguing ways.

Bethan Laura Wood’s collaboration with Baccarat puts a whimsical spin on crystal. Her jewel-like Mille Fleurs collection includes this chandelier and wall-mounted lights. 

Arper presents Aom by Jean-Marie Massaud, a seating series that replaces polyurethane with polypropylene and recyclable Breathair padding. It’s both good-looking and better for the environment.