EDRA

This fall I took a Short Design Course at Instituto Marangoni in Milan, during Design Week. To be in Milan and connected to a school that was hosting Design Week events, receiving instruction from faculty members who are actively working in their fields in a city at the center of the design world, both in fashion and furnishings, was incredible, to say the least.

Marangoni instructors had inside information about the best events to attend, and this wasn’t even part of the course, just an added bonus of being there during design week. Some of the highlights included Edra’s temporary showroom, hosted in Palazzo Durini, which was the pinnacle of experiences for me. Of course the Covid protocol was very strict, more so in Italy than in the rest of Europe at this time, but once inside, you were escorted by a salesperson who spoke your native tongue and knew the products, old and new, intimately. The setting was surreal, terrazzo floors, medieval beginnings:

Palazzo Durini in Via Santa Maria Valle 2 in Milan, today the seat of  the Alessandro Durini Foundation, has medieval origins. Palazzo Durini has been declared of artistic interest by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage. It was the residence of Vercellino Visconti of the dukes of Milan and through various inheritance passages it became part of the Durini family assets.

The baroque courtyard and the neoclassical façade testify to a succession of interventions that took place over the centuries and the interiors are rich in baroque stuccoes attributable to Martino Knoller. The palace was inhabited in the first decades of the nineteenth century by the painter and collector Giuseppe Bossi and the sculptor Antonio Canova kept his Milanese studio there.

It was the most captivating setting to see the new collections for Edra. Take a look for yourself!

Edra Showroom and Palazzo Durini: