Inside Track: Five Key Interiors Trends from Milan 2024

Milan in early April is where you’ll find the latest trends in furniture and product design. It’s where current thinking is captured in news reports and Instagram posts, and where the hottest global ideas take root. This year, there was a whole lot of joy on the table, not just at Salone del Mobile and key Fuorisalone locations, but in the streets of the city. So what were the top five recurring trends?

The 1970s
The big, bright, billowy spirit of the 1970s was a tangible inspiration for much of what was happening on Milan’s showroom floors. The decade’s playful materials, colours and shapes were in evidence in Zanotta’s new Giuno armchair by Calvi Brambilla and the reissued Gomma by De Pas, D’Urbino, Lomazzi, both in 1970s orange; in Array, a sofa by Snøhetta for MDF Italia that was reminiscent of the iconic DS-600 from 1972; in the chrome accents in Hannes Peer’s Aura sofa for Baxter; and in lighting from up-and-coming designer Kotaro Usugami. Loro Piana, meanwhile, celebrated the work of Cini Boeri, showing a version of her 1973 Botolo armchair for Arflex.

Oxblood red
As we finally emerge from the muted monochrome of minimalist interior design, it’s punches of colour that are sparking the most joy. In Milan, there were plenty of knockout tones to choose from. The brave will layer up, but for those in search of a token accent, oxblood red was the surprise shade at a number of key launches. It included an initiative by Gucci’s creative director, Sabato De Sarno, in which one iconic design each from Acerbis, cc-tapis, FontanaArte, Tacchini and Venini were tinted in the fashion house’s signature Rosso Ancora. Oxblood was also in evidence in Gallotti&Radice’s new Hide&Seek cabinet by Pietro Russo, and in the brilliant Interzone cabinetry by Muller Van Severen for BD Barcelona.

Social seating
The conversation pit – a sunken seating area designed for intimate social interaction – was a feature of the extravagantly proportioned modernist spaces of the 1960s and 1970s. Now it’s making its way back into the lexicon of interior architects. In Milan, it influenced seating conceptually, and was behind the communal cushioning of the Haus Dari system from Hall Haus, created for Design Space AlUla; Patricia Urquiola’s Insula for Kettal; Peaks by Yves Béhar at Moooi; and the Augusto semi-circular sofa system by Vincent Van Duysen for Molteni&C.

Pillowing
If there’s one word that defines the design of our decade, it’s comfort. Our concentrated search for it began during the enforced confinement of 2020, and we’ve seen seating blowing up in volume, with puffy silhouettes the norm, ever since. Where does it go from here? Pillowing: the piling up of soft, squashy layers to create sofas, seating and beds that will make you feel as if you’re sinking into a downy duvet. It was evident in Faye Toogood’s Cosmic collection for Tacchini; Willo Perron’s Pillo sofa for Knoll; the Fedro chaise longue by Studiopepe for Visionnaire; and Muller Van Severen’s Pillow sofa system for BD Barcelona.

Kitchen, what kitchen?
Every other year, Milan Design Week hosts Eurocucina, a show in which kitchen designers announce their latest concepts. While ever more sophisticated technology may have attracted attention this year, new materiality dominated the field, in particular the quest to integrate and conceal the functional parts of a kitchen behind unexpected substances. This included Patricia Urquiola’s Mantle freestanding modular Cimento-tiled fridge cabinet for Signature Kitchen Suite, and a cantilevered countertop with a concealed hob embedded in a rock at Gaggenau’s show at Villa Necchi.

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Pictures from top: Gaggenau’s counter with concealed hob (Christoph Philadelphia); playful lighting shapes from Kotaro Usugami; Clessidra rug by cc-tapis in Gucci’s Rosso Ancora; and Faye Toogood’s Cosmic collection for Tacchini (Andrea Ferrari)