For Donatella Versace, the home is like a couture dress

A double exhibition space ready to amplify the message and style behind Versace home collections focusing on sensuality and strength. This year, for the 61st edition of the Salone del mobile Milano 2023 and the Milan design week, the brand brought its novelties to the pavilions of Milano Rho fiera and to the city. Two locations able of interpreting the aesthetics of the fashion house, which draws on the precious Dna while giving life to a contemporary product. «With this double presence we wanted to bring our philosophy to the widest possible audience», Donatella Versace, chief creative officer, told MFF.

For this debut at the fair, a total black box was designed with a reflective ceiling and backlit silk crepe panels that define an almost theatrical architectural space where the new furnishings emerge from the darkness and seem to light up. The 2023 collection, once again created together with Luxury living group – Llg, which is part of Haworth lifestyle design, and designed in collaboration with Roberto Palomba and Ludovica Serafini of ps+a studio, highlights the new Zensational and Discovery upholstered furniture, a line declined as well for table and chair, and expands the family of some best-selling furnishings, including the La Greca line, which takes the stage of a large area of the stand and of the Via Durini store, with an armchair with a deep seat and swivel base, and the Stiletto sofa, which is completed with a new leather-covered top table, a tapered stool and a bergère armchair combined with a comfortable footrest.

What is your vision of the Versace home furniture project and how is it expressed in the new furniture collection unveiled at the last Salone del mobile edition in Milan?

The vision is the same as all of our collections. The focus is on the finest materials and workmanship with superb attention to the detail. The aim is to give a sense of power, sensuality, and strength.

You were present both at the Salone and in the city. What motivated the presentation of Versace home at the fair in such experiential and sensual space? How does the installation amplify the approach to this new collection?

We wanted Versace to live two moments during the Salone del mobile to bring our philosophy to the widest audience possible. When you are at the exhibition, you have to create something engaging and sensual to stand out and convey to people the feeling of what it means to live in the Versace world. In our space is easier to achieve that, but at the exhibition you need more attention, and I hope we reached this goal.

The new collection seems to be inspired more and more by the codes of the maison, between classicism and mythology, with contemporary references at the Versace collections we recently saw on the runways. How important is to create a legible thread between fashion and furniture?

It is extremely important. Furniture is the wardrobe of our houses, and as clothes, it accompanies us in all the key moments of our lives. It defines the place where we sleep, live, and love. I look at home collections with the same lens and perspective I look at clothing: the way it makes us feel, gives us confidence, and best enhances our home.

How does furniture influence your personal dimension and your creative process?

I have always loved the design of my homes and my offices. Environments are as important as the clothes we wear. When I sit on a sofa, I want to feel a certain way: supported, safe, and sensual. Sitting on a sofa from the new collection is like wearing one of our tailored suits because they are designed with the same rigor, attention to detail, and know-how.

What object or project would you like to have designed for Versace home that has not yet been realized?

Maybe a room, more than an object. I would like to design the Oval office in the White house for the first female president of the United States. (all rights reserved)