Setting standards: Milan shows a softer side

One of the items on display is Swedish design duo TAF’s Soft Triangle table, which features a bulging base and pastel peppermint shade to give the solid structure a lightness of form that is instantly inviting.

Meanwhile, Spanish designer Tomás Alonso is presenting a trestle-legged table that has on a cartoon-like feel, with one leg poking through the wooden tabletop in a contrasting bold green hue.

Karimoku creative director Teruhiro Yanagihara has softened the industrial feel of an oak and maple table by painting the top a shade of off-white.

Each of the nine products presented by Karimoku New Standard combines a sense of solidity with softness that indicates a gentler approach to modernist functionality. Find out more in our Emotional Functionality design direction. For more on the products being presented at Milan Design Week, read our Show Preview.