room for dreams opens at milan design week 2026 with full takeover of ME milan il duca

room for dreams is now live at ME Milan Il Duca

Now open during Milan Design Week 2026, designboom’s ROOM FOR DREAMS takes over ME Milan Il Duca, transforming the Aldo Rossi-designed hotel at Piazza della Repubblica into a layered environment where installations, live talks, daily rituals, and film screenings unfold. Conceived as a temporary ecosystem, the project explores dreaming as a deliberate tool for social and cultural transformation, activating the building through a sequence of immersive, interconnected experiences.

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From SolidNature and AMO/OMA’s installation led by Samir Bantal to the Cinema of Dreams by Paf atelier and a LIVE talk with Philippe Starck, the week-long program activates every corner of the hotel from April 20th to 26th, 2026.

all images © designboom, photography by Camilla Mansini with Giorgio Gagliano

a hotel reprogrammed as a sequence of dream states

Rather than a single exhibition, ROOM FOR DREAMS is structured as a progression. Each space within the hotel corresponds to a different phase of dreaming, moving from collective speculation to more introspective encounters. Visitors circulate between the open-air garden, the lobby, and the basement, where architecture becomes less about static form and more about staging experiences, atmospheres, and potential futures.

a layered environment where installations, live talks, daily rituals, and film screenings unfold

solidnature and amo/oma stage a slowed-down world

In the garden, SolidNature collaborates with OMA / AMO under the direction of Samir Bantal to construct Il Sonno, a large-scale installation that turns stone into a speculative medium. Everyday acts like shopping are reimagined as suspended, almost dreamlike rituals, shifting attention from consumption toward awareness and material presence.

Il Sonno by SolidNature and OMA / AMO under the direction of Samir Bantal

talks, encounters, and a live program of ideas

At ground level, the lobby becomes the project’s social core, hosting a week-long talks program that begins with Philippe Starck and continues with voices including DRIFT, Carlo Ratti, Stefano Boeri, and Ma Yansong. Across these sessions, dreaming is framed not as escapism but as a method, a way to prototype social, spatial, and ecological futures before they materialize.

the lobby becomes the project’s social core

a daily cinema program takes place below ground

In the basement, Paf atelier shapes the Cinema of Dreams as a suspended, immersive environment that runs daily screenings from 12:00 to 20:00. The program brings together films, short works, and interviews in collaboration with Louisiana Channel, alongside architectural documentaries by 9sekunden and features such as E.1027: Eileen Gray and the House by the Sea and Siza.

Each day begins with Advice to the Young, a compilation of reflections by figures including Peter Cook, Mariko Mori, and Balkrishna Doshi, before expanding into a broader sequence of screenings that mix architectural narratives with experimental storytelling. Midweek, the program shifts toward ecology with an Earth Day focus, while premieres such as The Talented Mr. Robi by Carlo Ratti Associati and Seeing Further by OPPO introduce new work produced in real time during the week.

Paf atelier shapes Cinema of Dreams

time, ritual, and media as parallel systems

Within the lobby, time, ritual, and media intersect as parallel ways of structuring experience. Ressence reframes time as something fluid rather than fixed, where its installation and Now is Better by Stefan Sagmeister shift emphasis from measurement to perception, proposing a more elastic sense of duration. In dialogue with this, La Marzocco’s Accademia del Caffè Espresso turns the everyday act of coffee into a performative, time-based ritual, where each guest roaster activates the space through taste, technique, and storytelling. Extending beyond the physical setting, collaborations with OPPO and INDX|GLOBAL position media as an active layer of the project, from the film Seeing Further, captured during the week, to live podcast recordings, framing content not as documentation but as something produced, circulated, and evolving in real time.

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a suspended, immersive environment that runs daily screenings from 12:00 to 20:00

dreaming as a design methodology

Across all layers of the project, ROOM FOR DREAMS positions imagination as an operative force rather than a passive state. Installations, conversations, and films do not function independently but reinforce one another, constructing a shared framework where design becomes a tool for projection. Within the intensity of Milan Design Week, the project carves out a slower, more speculative rhythm, proposing that to design today also means to rehearse alternative futures before they arrive.

La Marzocco translates the everyday act of drinking coffee into a time-based installation