In the spotlight: Mara’s fresh designs take the stage

If design were fashion then the Salone del Mobile would be a supermodel. It's certainly got the looks. Or, rather, it attracts the crowd with the looks. Seeing and being seen is built into the very architecture of Fiera Milano Rho, where endless walkways and travelators deliver a steady stream of whatever the plural of 'la bella figura' is. Visitors may be wearing comfortable shoes for this trade-fair marathon, but they've got their game-faces on. It's Italy, after all.

Premium Italian furniture manufacturer Mara took the spectacle of fashion as its cue for this year's Salone, creating for its stand an immersive space reminiscent of the live catwalk show, replete with runway and backstage wings. No pouting models, though. Instead a raft of new products, every bit as photogenic. Designed by Mara's in-house creative team, it was a playful mise-en-scène designed to encourage the inquisitive gaze of discerning guests.

For those of you who haven’t encountered Mara, here’s a super-short briefing. Founded in 1960 in Brescia, the brand has long secured its stake at the table via a research-driven portfolio of seating and table collections and systems – historically with a focus on office and contract – that emphasise considered design, innovation and functionality. Given the shift in how we live and work, married with the company’s long-time engagement with questions of well-being and comfort, it’s no surprise that its strategy has become increasingly transversal, as it pushes further into the residential segment.

Back to the Mara show in Milan. Among the fresh ‘talent’ on display were new additions to the LIBRO and FOLLOW product families, the former a group of space-saving folding tables on ultra-smooth castors and the latter a fully mechanical sit-stand collection that has bagged an EU Seal of Excellence for research and innovation.

Perhaps most striking, however, was a new seating collection called Icon – the result of a collaboration between the brand and Marcello Ziliani, a Brescia-based designer who, having studied at the Politecnico di Milano under Achille Castiglioni, has collaborated with some of the biggest-hitting Italian design producers. You might think it a little presumptuous to call a new product ‘Icon’, but, in spite of only having been launched recently, it has already been recognised with a 2023 German Design Award from the Rat für Formgebung (German Design Council).

With its enveloping form and generous upholstery – which, combined, present the user with the promise of comfort – Icon speaks the language of home. The technology contained within it, meanwhile, is something we’re used to experiencing in places of work. Unlike those ergonomic tasks chairs that want to wear their engineering credentials on their sleeve (like pieces of micro high-tech architecture), Ziliani and the R&D team at Mara have developed a chair that fully conceals its workings. Their innovative, yet hidden, system allows for the movement of the backrest and of the seat to be fully independent of each other, yet synchronised, meaning ultimate comfort.

As you would expect from any self-respecting premium manufacturer these days, there are numerous ways of architects and other specifiers configuring the exact look and feel that they are after for their particular project. A choice between high and low backrest, various frames and bases, in addition to a raft of finishes and fabrics mean that Icon works across a range of hospitality and hotel, office and residential settings. The upholstery can be removed either for cleaning or, indeed, an aesthetic refresh.

With the interiors we inhabit now more than ever required to function as open-ended programmes, which can be readapted over time according to need, Icon responds squarely as a flexible system. And also operates across a number of flanker product types; a lounge version of the chair has been made available, along with an Icon desk and stool.

Good, thoughtful design never goes out of fashion.

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