​Milan Salone 2017 Preview: Modular living

Although the rising cost of living and expanding urban populations means that living rooms are decreasing in size, their importance as the heart of everyday life at home remains constant. This is the concept behind Ikea’s Let’s Make Room for Life festival, which plays with the idea of creating a more multifunctional, technology-integrated design for the living room space that ‘meet[s] the functional and emotional needs of modern living’.

Located in a warehouse in the Lambrate district, the festival will explore ideas of sustainability, personalisation and sociability. The Swedish furniture manufacturer will show collaborations with Danish designers HAY, British designer Tom Dixon and the creative platform Design Indaba, among others.

Tom Dixon will introduce his Delaktig bed and sofa unit, a modular piece that is able to assume different identities throughout its lifetime through at-home modification.