The continuous dialogue with projects’ different requests and needs often required development and detailed prototyping of original design objects as answers to spatial and dwelling interpretation.
This stream of ideas, shaped by a generative approach, led to unprecedented solutions and innovative combinations of forms and materials now all collected by the Editions.
Massimiliano Locatelli studied architecture at the Milan Polytechnic and obtained his PhD with Kenneth Frampton at Columbia University in New York. He is a founding partner of Locatelli Partners. He designs in the most varied contexts: private homes, showrooms, retail, exhibition set-ups and new building construction.
His oeuvre includes numerous competitions and participation in exhibitions and Biennali: the restoration and functional redesign of the historical complex Piazza XXV Aprile (Porta Garibaldi) banned by the Municipality of Milan; the 9th Venice Architecture Biennale in the Metamorph News from the inside section; the exhibition “The Mobile Landscape of New Italian Design” at the Museum of La Triennale and he is the creative director of installation design for the Fontana Arte exhibition, “Vivere nel Vetro / House of Glass” at the Giorgio Cini Foundation in Venice.
His approach to the projects for fashion industry clients is to work 360° from offices to showrooms and to shops, enabling each of these spaces to serve as key elements of brand communication. The new construction projects have included the following, to name a few: the Lia Rumma Art Gallery, residential buildings, a kindergarten for children, the Nilufar Depot, and the Onward Luxury Group factory presented in the Italian Pavillion of the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale.
The conversion project of a building in central Milan that will house luxury residences is currently underway. The work on private residences is consistent.
Over time, projects of villas, townhouses, hotels particuliers, apartments and historic homes, are always carried out with a “tailor-made design” approach to interiors and elements of furniture. Hospitality and restaurants are other industries that Massimiliano Locatelli has undertaken : the restaurants at the Royal Villa in Monza, the Spago restaurant for Chef Wolfgang Puck in Las Vegas, a hotel de charme in Asia.
Since 2012, his work on custom furnishings, which are usually created for site-specific projects, has become its own independent collection of furniture and design that continues its dialogue with research. The development of architectural materials and the future of construction led him to design “3D Housing 05”, the first 3D printed concrete house which earned him the Best Sustainability award at the 2018 Milan Design Week.
On the occasion of Fuorisalone 2021, the new B&B Italia showroom in Milan was inaugurated; an architectural project where Massimiliano Locatelli has recreated a new space using light and transparency to both enhance its volumes and connections with Milan.