If you had just one day at design week in Milan, how would you spend it? That’s the question I posed to myself when I landed in the city for its 63rd edition. The answer turned out to be: See 11 exhibitions, attend two dinners, shake upwards of 50 hands, take more than 1,100 photos, and set a new personal record for most steps taken in a day at 23,532. (Take that, Duncan Nielsen!)

Between a room made entirely from cork, a maze wrapped in faux fur, and a decrepit space with loose floorboards underfoot, photographer Olga Mai and I were able to cover a lot of ground—more than eight miles worth. Here’s everything we saw on Thursday last week as we zigzagged across Milan.

Nilufar Depot (10:00-10:40 a.m.)

On Thursday morning, we were off to a late start because someone
missed the train. But I was able to catch up with Olga around 10:20 a.m. just outside of Nilufar Depot, a Milanese gallery and staple of Milan Design Week that’s known for its juxtapositions of older icons and newer designs. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of the depot (Nilufar Gallery proper has been around since 1979), Nilufar designed its presentation to function as something of a walking theater, unfolding as five acts across its three floors. When walking through the space, it almost felt like exploring an impeccably curated vintage store, as familiar floor lamps, tables, and chairs stood against brand new designs. The effect was a fantastic tasting menu of where we’ve come from in furniture design, and where we might be headed.

Houses We Love: Every day we feature a remarkable space submitted by our community of architects, designers, builders, and homeowners. Have one to share? Post it here.

Project Details:

Location: Brunswick Heads, Australia

Architect: Fraser Mudge Architects / @frasermudge

Footprint: 2,131 square feet

Builder: Morada Build

Structural Engineer: Phillip Wallace

Landscape Design: Cooke Landscape Architecture

Lighting Design: LO-FI

Interior Design: Fraser Mudge Architects with We Are Triibe

Photographer: Tom Ross / @tomross.xyz

From the Architect: “The project recomposes an original Brunswick Heads beach cottage, providing a modern addition to a classic ’70s Australian coastal streetscape. A new half level is added above and below the existing (raised) split-level home, leaving four split levels connected via a central staircase.

“The house was designed for a family of four interested in living in an unconventional but small building footprint. Each half level has its own personal connection to a series of gardens, including roof gardens and a garden void that provides each level with it’s own unique atmosphere.

“The covered outdoor area is pushed out from the building, not only defining the garden void but allowing winter sun to pass over the single-story kitchen/living wing and fall into the space.

“The primary en suite is designed as an outdoor space, without any windows, which defines a direct connection to the roof garden. Hinged timber screens can be adjusted to control light and privacy to the area.”

Location: 412 Glen Holly Drive, Pasadena, California 

 Price: $1,895,000

Year Built: 1938

Architect: William Kesling

Footprint: 2,106 square feet (3 bedrooms, 3 baths)

Lot Size: 0.14 Acres

From the Agent: “A rare 1938 streamline moderne home prominently anchored in the cherished Poppy Peak Hills area of Pasadena. Kesling’s unquestionable creativity and design talents were only superseded by his apparent financial misdeeds—while serving in San Quentin for fraud in 1937, he allegedly allowed the John L. Hudson Construction Company to oversee and sign off on the completion of the home. The uppermost level has direct access to the living room, dining area, galley kitchen (with a newer dishwasher and Sub-Zero refrigerator), and a half bath. A broad outdoor deck, reminiscent of a steamliner’s bow, provides effortless alfresco entertaining and captivating hillside views. The primary bedroom offers a full bath with dual vanity sinks and a walk-in closet. Two additional bedrooms, a complimentary full bath with a step-in shower, and an adjacent balcony complete the middle level. The garage, laundry, and storage can be found on the lower level.”

Although the Indian city of Rajkot is located in the west-coast state of Gujarat, it’s far enough inland that its climate is hot, with daytime highs averaging over 90 degrees for eight months a year, and over 100 from April through June. That’s why, when moving into an apartment tower there, architect Abhishek Patel and his family (including his wife and parents) chose a west-facing unit on the top floor, 14 stories up, to take advantage of cooling evening breezes.

Because the tower is located next to Saurashtra University, with its lower-slung buildings and a large cricket field, “It’s a seamless view,” Abhishek says. “I can enjoy sunsets and even cricket matches from my balcony.”

For the second year, Alcova, the fair focused on emerging designers that runs in tandem with Salone del Mobile, has set up shop at multiple venues in Varedo, Italy—about 15 kilometers north of Milan. This year, in addition to the 1940s modern Villa Borsani and the beautifully crumbling Villa Bagatti Valsecchi, Alcova has added a stunning abandoned factory and disused greenhouses.

All of the sites offer unconventional yet fitting backdrops for the experimental works on display. Touring the press preview with photographer Olga Mai, we were struck by the range of textures, materials, and ideas—from glazed lava and reappropriated wood to deeply conceptual and more socially charged installations.

While this was my first in-person visit, I sensed a slight tonal shift from years past. If you enter this edition of the fair thinking you’ll encounter only the weirdest of the weird, you’ll be surprised to discover plenty of minimalist (though forward-thinking) designs sprinkled throughout the showcase. Still, it’s pretty clear—at Alcova, creative risk certainly takes center stage.

Below, you’ll find a few of what we found to be this year’s highlights. By transforming spaces—whether revered or forgotten—into moments of radical expression, each of them offers a delightful and thought-provoking experience. They remind us that many of today’s most exciting designs are made, and shown, on the fringe.

Wanting an occasional break from the city, Hákon and Lilja started looking for a place they could escape to. “It was important for us to have a retreat where we could disconnect from the fast pace of urban life and immerse ourselves in nature,” Hákon says. The Reykjavík residents imagined something in the countryside where they could relish Iceland’s short-but-sweet summers, and in colder months, peer out from wide windows. “Somewhere we could experience the changing seasons from our living space,” adds Lilja.

• In Ohio’s Amish country, E-bikes are zipping past horse-drawn buggies, as if the future is lapping the past. Now the divided community has to decide whether the bikes are a modern convenience or a threat to tradition. (The Wall Street Journal)

•  Japan built the world’s first 3D-printed train station in just six hours—offering a fast, cost-cutting solution to rural rail challenges amid a shrinking population. Here’s how they did it. (The New York Times)

• Locked out of New York City by strict, short-term rental laws, Airbnb is pouring $5 million into a SuperPAC to back election candidates who support loosening those restrictions—and the city’s powerful hotel industry is not happy. (Gothamist)

• Contracting work has devolved into a ruthless grind of cut-rate bids and illegal labor practices, driving even the most skilled workers out of the industry. One Connecticut homebuilder shares just how bad things have become. (The New York Times)

• Dwell’s executive editor, Kate Dries, visited Stockholm recently to preview the 40th anniversary of Ikea’s Stockholm Collection, which was just released. While there, she asked the company’s designers which items they keep for themselves. (Dwell)

Top image courtesy of Serendix Inc./neuob Inc.

Location: 2244 Round Top Dr, Honolulu, Hawaii

Price: $3,495,000

Year Built: 1974

Architect: Chip Detweiler

Renovation Designer: Rick Kinsel

Footprint: 2,064 square feet (2 bedrooms, 2 baths)

Lot Size: 0.23 Acres

From the Agent: “This tropical brutalist home, designed by architect Chip Detweiler, is a striking example of minimalist design that perfectly integrates with its natural surroundings. With open-screen windows inviting the tropical elements inside, the home embodies the principles of passive architecture. Detweiler’s use of concrete, wood, and stone creates a clean, honest aesthetic that highlights simplicity and functionality. The bold structure, paired with deep ocean-blue accents, reflects the essence of tropical brutalism, offering a timeless connection to the Pacific landscape. Detweiler’s design not only captures the beauty of the environment but also delivers a space where luxury and functionality meet, enhancing the experience of living both indoors and out.”

Before: A view of the home’s original living area.

Add credit

Welcome to Sofa Sagas—stories about the circuitous search for a very important and occasionally fraught piece of furniture.

When I moved into my Brooklyn apartment in 2020, there was already a couch in the living room—far too wide to be removed, I was told, and very comfortable. Because I’d just spent the equivalent of one month’s paycheck on the things I’d need to live in this apartment, the couch was fine. Aesthetically, not my taste, yes, but comfortable enough for me to sit on and watch TV for hours in silence. After a year or so living with this sofa, which was large, brown, overstuffed, and sort of hideous, it became the target of my decor-related ire. I did not like the couch; crucially, I didn’t pick out the couch, and so, because of that reason specifically, it had to go.

Buying a new couch is a fraught and stressful decision for reasons we enumerate frequently at this publication—the furniture you choose to live with says what you don’t about who you are, and often, nice things cost big money. The couch of my dreams is a Maralunga, specifically the one I saw once on Chairish in prissy lilac leather. It cost around $4,000 and needed to be shipped from Italy, both factors that put it far out of budget and practicality. I pivoted my search towards a spate of your standard Instagram furniture purveyors, lured in by the prospect of being able to get what I wanted when I wanted it, and how. And, for reasons I still don’t understand, the next sofa I wanted was to be green—not quite olive and not quite emerald, but a green that, perhaps, only existed in my head.

Armed with these requirements, I found a couch that I liked enough: an olive-pine green three seater with a vaguely midcentury feel, with a bench cushion, a decision that would come to haunt me in the future. The price was right (under $2,000 and financed over a year with no interest), it could be delivered to me in a reasonable amount of time, and came in flat boxes that I could reasonably get into my apartment myself.

 A couple of days before the new couch was set to arrive, two men removed the big brown one from my living room, a treacherous process that took out one banister post from the stairs and I fear nearly killed the men I’d hired for this task. I tipped them generously and enjoyed sitting on the floor of my empty living room until my new couch was delivered. When it arrived, I very politely asked one of my sisters to help me drag the boxes up the stairs; once she left, it took me about 20 minutes to assemble the new sofa and shove it into place. It is at this point where I realized that I’d made two mistakes, neither of which were particularly grave at the time, but would later contribute to the couch’s eventual downfall. One, the couch itself was not nearly as comfortable as I’d anticipated; and two, more importantly, the bench cushion I selected for aesthetics, did look good, but wasn’t the most long-lasting solution.

The furniture you choose to live with says what you don’t about who you are, and often, nice things cost big money.

Over time the couch got more comfortable but really only in one spot, my preferred corner, which positioned me with the best vantage point to watch TV while reading a book. I flipped the cushion; I tried sitting on the other side a bunch. But after five years or so, I realized that there was nothing more I could really do—the couch was lumpy now, and worse, the green that I’d selected with such care was now the only thing I could think about when spending any time in my living room.

The other couch I wanted to buy that wasn’t the expensive Italian one was a less-expensive Danish one: the Teddy by Omhu, a big squishy pile of foam anchored by two Corbusier-adjacent chrome bars. I found it in a store in my neighborhood and sat on it multiple times; I measured my very narrow living room in an attempt to see if this large and wide boy would fit. Various people in my life who were privy to my obsession tried to tell me that this couch would be too large; I listened but did not necessarily hear their warnings. And honestly, if I had followed the impetuous demon that occasionally grabs ahold of my credit card, I think that I’d be disappointed now. But luckily, the couch I would soon truly love was the couch I didn’t even know I needed—and getting it was a labor of love and an awful lot of money. 

After much discussion, a friend bought a sofa on Facebook Marketplace, a low-slung, vintage three-seater, in a nubby cattlehair blend fabric, resting on a rectangular mirrored base, made by Eppinger Furniture., a company based on the Upper East Side in New York that made custom office furniture in the 1960s that wouldn’t be out of place in a well-appointed home now. (This burlwood and chrome desk is ready for the boardroom of a Madison Avenue ad agency, and yes, is heavily inspired by Milo Baughman’s work.) I loved it; she loved it, until she got it, lived with it in her house for a bit, and realized that it was not her style at all. I sat on the sofa and found it comfortable. I wanted the sofa to be mine. And $600 later, it was.

Thankfully, because it is 2025 and the task economy is booming, it was very easy for me to get the sofa from her house, which is at the other end of Brooklyn from mine. Two men again came to my apartment in the early hours of the morning and removed my old couch for donation. Two different men drove to my friend’s house, loaded the sofa into their truck, and brought it up the stairs to me. Once they made it up the two twisty, narrow landings, and into the hallway directly outside my apartment, it became clear pretty immediately that there was no way this couch was going to get through the door.

After fifteen minutes of trying to, I don’t know, shove the sofa in myself, I realized that 1) the men who brought it up here were charging by the minute and 2) there was no way in hell this would work. “You might have to call someone,” one man said to me, as he gathered his moving blankets. “Like maybe the Couch Doctor.”

Couch doctors—or surgeons, your preference—are services that will disassemble and reassemble your furniture item so that it can fit through the door and get into your home. There is something terrifying about what they do—how can a sofa be sawn in half like a magician’s assistant and then reassembled as if it never happened in the first place? A part of me never wanted to find out firsthand, but when faced with the sofa I loved (and purchased), standing at attention in my narrow hallway, I did what I had to do.

In a state of mild distress, as I assume all who use this service are, I texted the number on NYC Couch Doctor’s website and explained the situation. A third, different, set of men showed up about 45 minutes later and after a brief examination, explained what would have to happen. Sawing the thing in half and shoving it through the door was not in the cards—the rectangular base, attached to the bottom of the sofa so that it appears to be floating, was the problem. After about 20 minutes, I emerged from the bedroom and found the sofa being put back together in my living room. The men had removed the base, reattached it, and placed the couch where I wanted it to go. I sent them on their way, and after a 15 minute period of relaxing and reassessing my financial situation in light of this $950 task, I felt something akin to peace. All told, between the sofa itself, the multiple movers, and the couch doctors, I spent around $2,000. The couch I loved was now mine—and, given the effort it took to get it in here, will be mine forever, or as long as I decide to stay in my apartment. To get the thing out of my house again will require the same service. It’s a price I might be willing to pay in the future, but for right now, my sofa and I are happy.

Illustration by Franz Lang

Related Readimg:

My Big-Box Store Sofa Does Exactly What My DTC Sofas Didn’t

My Wayfair Sofa Is Perfectly Fine—and That’s Good Enough for Me

As a part of our 25th-anniversary celebration, we’re republishing formative magazine stories from before our website launched. This story previously appeared in Dwell’s June 2001 issue. 

“I could care less about tatami,” 37-year-old graphic designer Shingo Fujiwaki says casually as he pushes a shock of long, black hair out of his eyes. Instead, when he had a chance to scrap his parents’s 30-year-old house with its traditional straw flooring and replace it with the home of his dreams, Fujiwaki went in search of an architect who could give him what he wanted: a blank, white shell. In Katsu Umebayashi, the 37-year-old head of the design firm FOBA, he found just the man. And, in Fujiwaki’s house, FOBA found what proved to be a perfect prototype for its new venture: FOB Homes, the architects’s foray into the market of the housemakers, whose kit-of-parts homes account for almost all new houses built in Japan.

A 12-person practice founded in 1995, FOBA is based in Uji, a tea-growing town outside of Kyoto. FOBA is known for its experimental houses and inventive commercial projects such as its own headquarters building, “Organ,” a snaking tube of continuous space complete with level changes and quirky angles.

The 1,376-square-foot house that FOBA built for Fujiwaki and his family sits on a corner site smack dab in the middle of Suita, a kind of Japanese Levittown on the outskirts of Osaka that was created at the time of the 1970 Expo (held nearby). Against the backdrop of the neighborhood’s drab cookie-cutter homes, the Fujiwakis’s house is hard to miss. It is a stark white concrete box—no parapets, no balconies, no ornament, no nothing. And, of course, there’s not a curve in sight. It doesn’t even have any windows aside from a low strip of glass on one side and a large plane of frosted glass on the other. Then there’s the facade: a brilliant white wall, unbroken except where a niche was carved out for the entry foyer. Though almost entirely shut off from the outside world, the house was not meant to be introverted or insensitive. On the contrary, “whenever you face a blank wall to a neighbor, it’s a favor,” says FOBA associate Tom Daniell. The walls politely protect the Fujiwakis’s privacy and that of their neighbors. And because they are set back from the property line, they also create welcome buffers of open space between houses. This is no small feat given the density in areas like this, where plots are small and houses are close together.

While this house may look modern with a capital “M,” the orthodoxy doesn’t extend much past its right angles and unadorned walls. The organization of this house and the way the Fujiwakis live in it are definitely homegrown. This becomes apparent the moment the threshold is crossed. Taking over where the exterior stone paving leaves off, polished concrete becomes the house’s interior floor. Nonetheless, the Fujiwakis exchange outdoor shoes for indoor ones before proceeding into the heart of the house: a double-height, combined living and dining room that somehow connects with almost every part of the building. In one direction it flows into a sleek galley kitchen, a stainless-steel Italian import, where the Fujiwakis can whip up espresso without dropping out of the conversation. In another direction it opens seamlessly onto an enclosed courtyard with glass doors that slide open to flood the room with daylight and fresh air (though the dog is the only family member to spend much time out there). A freestanding metal staircase connects to the second floor. But both primary bedroom, a modest affair with just enough space for a double bed, and dressing room, with its exposed hanging bar loaded with the Fujiwakis’s de rigueur black, white, and gray wardrobe, overlook the living area below. Even the upstairs bathroom, a narrow, skylit corridor lined with the most elegant fixtures money can buy, is linked to the main room.

The Fujiwakis’s house is a far cry from the imitation Western-style homes churned out by house manufacturers who build with Lego-like prefab pieces or even their upscale made-to-order cousins. If you buy a car, camera, or watch in Japan, there are loads of good designs to choose from, explains Fujiwaki. But housemaker houses are another story. “You have no choice—it’s bad design or nothing,” says Fujiwaki. True, they come in a vast array of styles and they can even incorporate a traditional tearoom, complete with the customary tatami mats and the decorative alcove known as a tokonoma, plus a pass-through kitchen all under one gabled roof. But design-wise their stock solutions, based on the Western ideal of separate rooms for separate functions, are criticized for being bland at best, and at worst, poorly suited to the Japanese lifestyle. “The only things most people decide on is which housemaker, how many rooms, and how much they’ll spend,” laments Umebayashi.

It’s not cutting-edge design that customers are after when they visit housemakers’s showrooms and websites. The lure of the housemaker house is that it is a known entity before ground is ever broken. Each one comes with the promise of being built on time and on budget. It’s also guaranteed: Should the synthetic slate roof leak, the company’s 24-hour hotline is always ready to provide service with a smile. And because everyone is doing it, there is never the worry of having a house that’s going to raise eyebrows. If the client wants a customized design statement, he can always hire an architect. Yet many prospective homeowners shy away from the incumbent risks of not knowing what sort of self-indulgent house an architect will concoct or how much it will actually cost. “Very few clients want a work of art; most want a life tool, a life container,” says Umebayashi. Between these two extremes of standardized housemaker homes and one-off, architect-designed creations lies the gap which FOB Homes plans to fill by offering a design-conscious alternative that tops the construction quality of the housemakers’s house but matches the price, which usually starts at $300,000 (not including land costs).

How can FOB Homes pull this off? By dividing the building process into six steps that provide the clarity and convenience of the housemaker’s formulaic method and standardizing the design process to limit client choices. Though FOB Homes has yet to fully utilize this system, its products so far have a similar look and are planned as continuous internal spaces (albeit with careful functional zoning) that are composed from a conceptual kit of parts. Enclosed outdoor spaces are also part of the package.

“We want to make living fun and satisfying.” says Mitsue Masunaga, the head of FOB Coop, a nationwide chain of 12 shops devoted to spreading the gospel of good design. Together with Umebayashi, her nephew, she is the driving force behind FOB Homes. Her shops, named after the shipping term “free on board,” stock a range of interior goods, both foreign made and local, and she is eager to add house designs to her inventory. “The thing that people want most is a house,” says Masunaga, “so I want to sell them.” So kitchens are open and inviting, storage is generous enough to conceal all manner of unsightly clutter, and bathrooms are the most sumptuous spots in each house. (The Fujiwakis’s bathroom features a miniature garden and a German-made Duravit tub.) This approach provides an image of the house and its organizational framework, but the rest can be tailored to meet the needs of the most persnickety clients. Even the signature white surfaces are just a starting point. Be it the art on the walls, the food on the kitchen counter, or, as at the Fujiwakis’s house, their forest-green canoe which sits outside, decoration and color come from the client.