INDUSTRY RELATED: MILAN DESIGN WEEK REVIEW

Part One: Observations from the Design Addicted on Everything but the Product at Milan Design Week 2025

Industry Related is a weekly newsletter to unmask and straight-talk brand comms, from a multi-national, award-winning team that's worked with Airbnb, Diageo, The Eames Institute, Kartell, Harry's, iF Design, and Savile Row, to name just a few.

Amy reporting here today from London where it’s a sunny and beautiful 63F/17C and my weekend of silence is coming to an end. I don’t know what makes walking, talking, viewing, eating, and drinking so exhausting, but I can tell you firsthand, the departures gates of Milan Linate airport from Thursday of this past week rival only those of Vegas in terms of the sheer mass of humans quietly contemplating their life choices.

An overflowing bin in Brera: the unbranded popcorn that sparked an hour long queue (we’re told - we, of course, don’t queue), all forms of Salone survival kit including water, coffee, and cigarettes, product brochures (of course), and finally the packaging of the Stanley flasks given away at the Asus event

RUMINATIONS ON OUR FAVOURITE DESIGN MEGA-GATHERING

Of course, there’s a lot to stay about Milan Design Week and I’m struggling trying to weave it into one not-insanely-long missive. So we’ll do it in two parts - first for all, second for our loyal subscribers. Remember as always with Industry Related, if you want to SEE the design (good, bad, and Good Lord), there’s your Instagram feed for that. We’re here to ruminate on brand presentation and communication. So we’re going to break this down into a few observations we made throughout the week. Here we go…

1. DID YOU COME TO GET THAT CONTENT OR GET THAT COIN?

Let me be the first to tell you the FAIR IS BACK. In these times of economic uncertainty, furniture and interior brands don’t have the time or budget to fck around. We spoke with two major brands who had been showing in town (at the Fuorisaloni, if we’re being technical) and who are now at the fair - both for the first time. The fact is, at the end of the day, the A&D community - buyers, specifiers, architects, interior designers, etc. - are GOING to the fair, hell or high water. The numbers are impressive - and by impressive we mean that some 370K+ people with buying power are trotting through those halls throughout the week. And they are there to do BUSINESS - to write orders, to specify, to make dreams come true. One of the aforementioned brands said they were writing orders on product that was nearly ten years old, but being seen for the first time by the people who actually buy it - rather than the ones just posting it on the Insta.

We spent a day up there and barely got through one hall (22/24) and a speed walk through the new designer aisles of Satellite; it’s EXHAUSTING, but there is so much to see and an abundance of great product. So at the end of the day, if you’re in the industry and actually came to do business - you should be at the fair. That said, if you’re industry-adjacent or just looking to latch on for a content play, stay in town. In the immortal words of Too $hort, “If you can’t play with the big dogs, stay on the porch.”

P.S. Please can someone talk to Salone about wayfinding? For a design fair, in Italy for god’s sake, it’s shockingly subpar.

2. PEOPLE WILL WAIT IN LINE FOR ANYTHING

Fun fact! Did you know the Italians have a verb for people who will wait in line for free shit? It’s scroccare - and the people who gleefully queue for any such tat are called scrocconi. Well, friends, the scrocconi were out in full force - and let me tell you, they hailed from all around the world. Why on earth would anyone find their time so invaluable that they would hop in a queue for a box of stale popcorn (wildly unbranded) from a Loro Piano kiosk? It’s not like Loro Piano is known for its amazing popcorn. On that note, WTF does popcorn have to do with the brand at all? It was a gorgeous structure, don’t get me wrong, but like, what are we meant to take away from it besides shitty popcorn? They didn’t even put a logo on the box so those of us peering at it in an overflowing bin could answer the obvious first question: where did that come from?

My other favourite hour-plus line was for a wee Byredo trolley. I asked TWO people in line what they were queuing for and both responded the same: BYREDO. But what from Byredo? No clue. Guess what, Relatives? It was a sample. You could have trotted over to the counter at La Rinascente and procured one for free there, minus the wait. Just saying.

3. FASHION BRANDS RUINED IT FOR THE TRUE DESIGN FOLKS

(Alt title: IF YOU’RE QUEUING FOR TWO+ HOURS TO SEE TEAPOTS THAT AREN’T FOR SALE OR AVAILABLE TO YOU IN ANY SORT OF WAY, ASK YOURSELF WHY?)

Continuing on the thread of queuing endlessly, we move into how fashion brands have stuck it to the design industry when it comes to design week. Remember Relatives, fashion brands have something entitled FASHION WEEK. Well, it seems Milan Design Week is now the more popular event for their industry. So if fashion attracts mass audience, you’re asking yourself, how does that RUIN it for designers and proper design industry professionals?

First off, no design industry brand can compete with the multi-million dollar marketing budgets of say Loewe, Hermes, Louis Vuitton, and the like. So of course they can take over massive spaces and (usually) do something insanely meta/interesting/visually compelling. The media will go (because they can skip the queue) - and report because fashion houses drive clicks and have the advertising budget to boot - clicks drive up ad dollars - I get it. Therefore, dwindled are the editorial pages dedicated to DESIGN brands and with it a plethora of media ops for the industry. Sure, we gathered up a nice pile of media for our clients, but as you’re reading MDW round-ups start counting how many are design industry adjacent or straight-up fashion - elbowing out the design brands for coveted editorial space.

Now here’s a fashion/auto lock-up we can get behind… GALLO for Fiat’s adorable Topolinos. Useful mode of transport and the socks are cute as well!

Then take into consideration that fashion brands attract their peers in the car and tech industries - who also seem to have boucou marketing dollars that allow them to do things like take over an entire space at god-knows-what-cost for some sort of “time machine” installation so one could view two cars - all it seems for the Instagram with no proper designer in sight. (Which brings to mind this genius post by our friends over at FOR.SCALE - it’s all about SCENE it seems) Now, that said, we do need to give some love and gratitude to our friends in the automotive industry as it seems they were basically the ONLY ONES flying in journalists. I mean, thank fck for Lexus bringing over a sizeable press trip as without them, international media would have been thin on the ground. (And to be fair, Lexus has over the years built a LEGIT design awards programme that supports young designers and puts them on show during the week. A HUGE leg-up opportunity for the next generation). The Salone del Mobile itself used to sponsor a massive global trip that ensured design week was covered in the literal sense of editorially and design brands got their share of column inches. Those dollars seem to have dried up (not sure why as it’s no cheap feat to participate in the fair) so we’re now taking scraps of valuable press time from the industry adjacent who again have that kind of splash-out budget.

Oh and I’m not finished (maybe this should have been its own post 😏)….Then come the masses that fashion attracts. Not the even the design-enthused masses. They are of the content-obsessed variety. They who have two-plus hours to wait in a line - those in the DESIGN industry do not (and if you do, I worry for you). So now, even if said fashion/car/tech brand has brought one of your favourite global designers to craft a not-for-sale teapot - tough titties - you won’t have the opportunity to be inspired by it IRL. BUT a 15-year-old on hols with her parents for Spring Break will definitely get that content. And maybe she’ll even buy a Loewe bag because of it 🤷🏼‍♀️

---

To be continued in Part Two where we dive into a few further observations, along with, as always, TIPS for how to execute well and with impact for the next edition. We also have a shout-out to executives bit as we saw some standout hands-on engagement from head honchos that left us inspired for the next generation of leadership.

As always, we’d love to hear from you! We’re particularly curious to hear what brands who were in town set as the expected ROI from Milan Design Week and how they are measuring it? Furthermore, was it achieved?

Thanks so much for being our loyal subscribers! How do y’all feel about being called Relatives - a genius idea from Chloe that seems to be sticking with us.

With love from Alpha Kilo