De Padova
New showroom, Milan

5 February 2016

The most tangible sign of the corporate maneuver that has led to the merger of De Padova and Boffi is undoubtedly the abandonment of the former’s historic Milanese showroom on Corso Venezia. The new outlet of the brand that has shaped the history of Italian design is located at Via Santa Cecilia 7, physically close to the old location but remote from it in image and identity. Previously in a building with large windows facing onto a busy street, an icon of the city, the showroom is now in a large industrial loft hidden from the view of passersby, accessible on foot through a tunnel that leads into a brightly lit atrium with a garden. The 1,100 square meters exhibition space was designed by Piero Lissoni to optimize the integration between the pieces made by De Padova and Boffi’s range of kitchen and bathroom fittings and storage systems, complemented by the partnership with around twenty brands specializing in a wide variety of materials: from tiles to resins, from wood to fabrics, from pictures to modern Scandinavian collectibles. In the projections of Roberto Gavazzi, CEO, and Luca De Padova, President, the customers who will be drawn to this sales outlet are not going to come there to buy individual pieces, but in search of a lifestyle, and will be aided in their choice by an in-house team of architects. The objective is to give a new character to the retail of high-end furniture and to bet on internationalization: it is in fact the first in a series of new stores that will be proposing the synergy between the two brands in the main centers of Europe, Asia and the United States: around fifteen of them by the end of February 2016.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.

DePadova, nuovo showroom.


Loredana Mascheroni

A journalist, she has always been interested in design. Passionate about contemporary art and architecture, she has worked at Domus since 1997, following a decade-long apprenticeship with other magazines in the sector and an early experience as a TV news journalist that left her with a partiality for video interviews. She does yoga and goes running, to loosen up the tensions caused by overuse of the tablet.


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