What to see during Miami Design Week 2023

As Design Miami 2023 continues through the weekend, we explore the best design beyond the fair’s borders, from temporary and permanent installations across the Miami Design District to the new, must-see disruptive fair in town. Explore our highlights below.

Miami Design District: installations

Multidisciplinary artists and designers left their mark across the Miami Design District, creating moments of wonder and reflection around the area. These include digital artist Andrés Reisinger’s first IRL takeover, the distinctive pink draping of his virtual images brought to life over a building in the district (178 NE 39th St).

Everywhere in the district, visitors can pause to discover Lara Bohinc’s Utopia series of cork furniture and sculptures. Part of the Design District’s annual commission and on view for a year, the installation includes outdoor seating, such as stools and armchairs connecting into sofas, as well as tables and oversized light sculptures (equipped with solar panels). Bohinc also created 900 egg-shaped birdhouses, and an egg-like centrepiece that she imagines as a sculptural refuge for animals and children.

Now a permanent fixture of the Miami Design District is Samuel Ross’ ‘Expression.Service.Essence’ project, comprising 12 bench designs that will help shape the ever-evolving neighbourhood. ‘It is a forum of experimentation that takes shape as an optimistic, expressive, accessible form,’ he told Wallpaper*. ‘Channelling and contorting the behaviours of what it is to fundamentally operate as a British sculptor or artist through seating, the public forum and explicit gestures of optimism are at the core of all 12 functional sculptures.’

Also in the district is Gaetano Pesce’s ‘Again Miami With Multidisciplinary Works’, a solo exhibition at MDD (30-40 NE 40th St), a ‘time-machine show’ exploring Pesce’s experimental approach to objects, and featuring both new and archive works. 

Design Showrooms: new openings and more

New openings in the Design District this year include Cassina (3901 NE 2nd Ave) and B&B Italia, the latter unveiling its Studio concept with a two-storey, 1,950 sq m space designed by Lissoni & Partners (4141 NE 2nd Ave). 

At Molteni&C (4100 NE 2nd Ave), artist Roberto Ruspoli offered guests a live drawing session earlier this week, transforming the showroom’s interior with his distinctive, Roman-inspired trait.