SOLIDIFIED on the verge of blossoming

ONE WEEK ABOUT Milano Design Week 2026
Day 1 – Report by David Heldt

If you’re driving from Amsterdam to Milan, the world consists of asphalt, shredded truck tires, bad coffee, fast-food chains, and if you hit the road early enough, you’ll come across truck drivers in flip-flops and bare chests urinating against their wheels and showering behind their trailers. A life turned inside out, so to speak.

The journey takes you past industrial parks, distribution centers, factories, and gas stations. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think the world consisted solely of the production and distribution of goods. The world becomes a little more beautiful again as you pass through the Alps, but the outskirts around Milan are once more endlessly gray. The Randstad in the Netherlands, the Ruhr region in Germany, and the Po Valley around Milan are among the most polluted regions in Europe.

In a van loaded with, among other things, beautiful rugs by Claudy Jongstra, furniture from the House of Finn Juhl, lamps from Studio VANTOT, and glassware by Nienke Sikkema, I drive through this dystopian world. As the scenery grows more beautiful along the way, and the snow-capped peaks give way to endless vineyards, I decide to exit the highway in search of a winery. On my phone, I find an organic winemaker at the end of the valley. Just as I think I’ve driven my big van into a trap on a steep little road, I’ve arrived. Another world. The farmer’s wife lets me taste her wines at 11 a.m. A dog sniffs at my shoes; the scent of asphalt, rubber, and public restrooms is lost on him. Nature in the spring is overwhelming and healing. This is where you want to be. I buy wine for the opening party of the SOLIDIFIED exhibition.

Toward the end of the trip, the sun breaks through, we’ve had some good coffee, and I’m getting more and more excited about it. Yes, Milan is a dirty city, but the Milanese are masters at accepting adversity and making decay look elegant. Lunch here heals all wounds and is the great equalizer; lawyers, painters, and artists eat their lunch here, table to table, every day. The atmosphere is good.

It took two full days to set up; the exhibition features work by some 30 designers whom I selected together with designer and curator Sanne Kaal. It’s remarkable to see the precision and dedication with which everyone prepared the exhibition and is now setting it up. Tomorrow, the exhibition will come into full bloom. Now it’s just a matter of giving it a little water.