Milan Furniture Fair / ICFF

Milan Furniture Fair / ICFF April / May 2007

Within a few short weeks two of the worlds most important design fairs happen…. April in Milan and May in New York… of course you could probably attend a fair every month somewhere in the world… however, These two fairs have an importance that may transcend all the others for a number of reasons. Firstly, the Milan Fair is still the fair that many of the worlds top manufacturers and designers consider the time when their major new introductions are revealed to the world and where the design press makes their determinations of who the years upcoming design darlings will be and ultimately can decide if a product will be a good seller or not… Of course this means that the designer or manufacturer needs to have their ducks in order in terms of production and delivery. This creates somewhat of a dichotomy since a number of producers introduce prototypes and wait to gauge the response from the press and public prior to committing to production. The quandary then becomes a situation whereby products are introduced, written about, and then not available for many months. Sometimes deliveries are not taking place until a year or so later when the cycle repeats itself all over again with a new fair…. Unfortunately this gives little time for the lifecycle of a product to take its natural progression into the marketplace. We think that maybe the designers and producers should slow things down a bit and strive to introduce fewer (but hopefully better) products into the market. This may sell a bit fewer magazines… but of course this will also save a few more trees.

Anyway, enough of a diatribe, New York hosts the ICFF (International Contemporary Furniture Fair) every May… This is the time that all the wonderful new designs introduced in Milan hit the US shores. The US market being what it is, extremely fragmented and not unlike five or six separate countries if you consider the cultural diversity etc, it is the show in New York that pretty much dictates what Americans will be looking to for their design fixes in the months to come. Although not as attuned to design as an integrated element of our everyday lives (at least according to our European compadres), we still think that if we are exposed to good design we will buy it. I guess that is why MOD exists. To bring good design to the US market. Check out the images from these two pivotal designs shows and let us know what you think…