Through an artistic exhibition - a special installation created by Matteo Fiorini in collaboration with Studio LYS - the LAUFEN brand inaugurated its revolutionary showroom in Milan. This new concept follows the Swiss brand's other zones located around the world.
The LAUFEN brand returned to Milan on the occasion of Milan Design Week in September 2021, with a new space - a unique showroom located on the second floor of an elegant building near the fashion district, Piazza della Scala, Duomo and Brera, one of the most fascinating parts of the city synonymous with art and design.
The showroom was designed in collaboration with Studio LYS
© LAUFEN
From September 4 to 10, 2021, LAUFEN's new showroom, designed by Matteo Fiorini and Studio LYS, hosted a temporary installation created by the same designers under the provocative title: "Am I Open?". The exhibition departs from the classic convention of presenting bathroom interiors - LAUFEN products were here arranged in space, like sculptures in an art gallery. The installation thus defined LAUFEN's vision and desire to establish, through similar brand zones around the world, a dialogue between art, design and architecture.
Upon entering the showroom, visitors were also able to discover "space within space." For LAUFEN presented its first virtual zone, a digital artificial world created by experienced designer Annabelle Schneider in collaboration with Swiss architects Gabrielle Hächler and Andreas Fuhrimann. Visitors were invited on an immersive digital journey that led them to a dreamlike and futuristic bathroom. In the inner courtyard, meanwhile, visitors were able to relax as they viewed the works of international fashion photographer Hugo Comte, who portrayed models in a project realized for KARTELL by LAUFEN.
LAUFEN products were arranged in space, like sculptures
© LAUFEN
Like the stage of the La Scala opera house not far away - the new showroom has been conceived as a fluid space, a stage on which LAUFEN's various voices come to life, allowing the brand to be explored in amazing and surprising ways. The special opening of the space in Milan was also accompanied by an exclusive dinner. The new LAUFEN location joined other zones designed in recent years around the world: from Madrid to Moscow, Miami to Vienna, Prague to Berlin. Each of them - like the LAUFEN Forum in Switzerland - offers, through bespoke concepts and architectural solutions, a different interpretation of the Swiss company's brand and identity.
In this way, each space becomes a local broadcaster that helps shape and communicate an international agenda, presenting the LAUFEN brand as an urban center of cultural debate. We are moving away from prestige. We are moving toward dialogue. We want to emphasize the brand experience as a coherent and holistic concept that creates a network of all our spaces around the world, as well as a zone for research, interpretation and questioning of existing solutions and concepts," says Roger Furrer, LAUFEN's marketing director.
LAUFEN schowroom
© LAUFEN
Originally, the 125-square-meter space of the new showroom in Milan was quite dark and compartmentalized, so the design for its renovation involved brightening and combining the rooms into a seamless layout with four main areas: a hallway, an open exhibition area, a mezzanine and a terrace. As a result, it's a space designed for flexibility of use without restrictions. Here, columns blend into the ceiling, lightweight panels create temporary rooms, and ceiling beams become waves that transmit light from above.
The design of the new LAUFEN showroom by Matteo Fiorini with Studio LYS was conceived as an overlay of interwoven layers to showcase the complexity of LAUFEN. The public and customers can thus learn about the brand by experiencing it in different aspects - from products, technical details and sophisticated materials to installations of images and video.
