SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection Debuts at Expo 2025 Osaka

The SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection will make its debut in Japan as a special guest of the Italy Pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka. From September 7 to September 20, 2025, SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection 1998–2025 will take centre stage, adding a compelling dimension to the Pavilion’s offering. The exhibition is a testament to the dynamic dialogue between international creativity and Italian craftsmanship.

Curated by Marva Griffin Wilshire, the event’s founder, the exhibition stands as a tangible celebration of the enduring partnership between emerging talent and Italian industry, offering a vivid embodiment of Expo 2025 Osaka’s theme: Designing Future Societies for our Lives.

A curated selection of 47 products, all originally presented as prototypes at SaloneSatellite and later chosen by companies for production, showcases 26 years of fruitful collaboration between under-35 designers and the Italian industry. Each object embodies shared values: innovation, production ethics, formal language, and accessibility.

“The choice of products for the SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection 1998–2025. Exhibition, in the Italy Pavilion at the Osaka Expo, focused on those made by Italian companies, to celebrate the enduringly fruitful marriage of international creativity and Italian industry that SaloneSatellite has promoted since its first edition in 1998. A dialogue that has allowed many young designers to find fertile ground for growth, to encounter Italian manufacturing excellence, and to give shape to their visions. This exhibition wants to pay homage to that initial moment, when everything begins, whilst also highlighting the results achieved: objects that today tell not only the story of a talent that has emerged, but also that of a virtuous model of cultural and productive collaboration,” said Marva Griffin.

SaloneSatellite as an Incubator of Talent

Under the umbrella of the Salone del Mobile.Milano, SaloneSatellite has become the most important global platform for young designers. Founded as a hub for under-35 talent, it is both an incubator and accelerator of excellence, fostering experimentation, cross-pollination, and cultural exchange between designers, companies, architects, and buyers.

“Osaka represents a strategic destination: it is the start of a new chapter in the international roadshow that takes the Salone del Mobile. Milano beyond national and European borders each year, in search of new audiences and new visions. Embarking in Japan, at Expo 2025 Osaka, with the SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection, is deeply significant: we are narrating the encounter between global creativity and Italian manufacturing, as well as the extraordinary dialogue between two design cultures that both believe in quality, respect for materials, and a balance between form and function. Japan is also an extraordinary creative interlocutor, with which Italy has built a solid bridge over time, as testified by giants such as Carlo Scarpa. Just as today, Oki Sato, Nao Tamura, Takahide Sano…are perpetuating this relationship. This SaloneSatellite homage to Osaka is the manifesto for the kind of design that brings together creatives, companies and territories… Japan is important because, like Italy, it is a country in which design forms an integral part of everyday life. A universal added value.” says Maria Porro, President of the Salone del Mobile.Milano.

Three “special pieces” will be on display, emblematic of collaborations between SaloneSatellite designers and Italian brands, alongside two works by Italian designers produced for foreign companies, including Raat (Dongmyung Lighting Co. Ltd) and a MoMA New York commission.

Porro expressed gratitude to the Italian Government, Commissioner General Ambassador Mario Vattani, and the Italy Pavilion team, saying “A collaboration that honours us and confirms the strategic value of Italian design in promoting the dialogue between countries and visions through the culture of design.”

Japanese Designers at the Forefront

At the heart of the exhibition are projects from some of the most noteworthy Japanese designers to have emerged from SaloneSatellite, each illustrating career paths that successfully merge cultural identity with contemporary vision.

Highlights include “Chab”, an essential and elegant coffee table by Nendo for De Padova, and his sculptural Koeda coat stand for Cappellini, which distills the encounter between nature and function into a pure, essential form. Nao Tamura’s Seasons serving ware for Covo poetically interprets the natural cycle of the seasons, while “Giava”, a fruit stand by Makoto Kawamoto for Aliantedizioni, embodies sleek and harmonious lines. Takahide Sano’s Kumo blown glass teapot for Massimo Lunardon blends Italian craftsmanship with oriental imagery, and the Cultivate Collection by Yuri Himuro for cc-tapis is a flatweave carpet created using a novel technique that turns the act of cutting into storytelling.

The Aatismo collective’s Water pendant lamp for Giorgetti reimagines water as both a vital and formal principle through a luminous design. These works, born of youthful visions, have matured into solid authorial languages, affirming the cultural and productive significance of the design bridge between Japan and Italy championed by SaloneSatellite.

Testifying to Japan’s key role on the emerging design scene, several young Japanese designers have won the SaloneSatellite Award over the years, in addition to numerous Special Mentions. Among the 42 award winners are Nao Tamura (2010), Bouillon (2016), Yuri Himuro (2018), Kuli Kuli (2019), Baku Sakashita (2019), the Honoka collective (2023), and Super Rat (2025). Works by Honoka and Super Rat will be featured in the exhibition, providing tangible evidence of the creative vitality and innovative design visions aligned with the spirit of research, sustainability, and cultural openness that define SaloneSatellite.

Exhibition Design and Pavilion Context

The exhibition design is by Ricardo Bello Dias, long-time SaloneSatellite layout designer, with Hariadna Pinate, as part of the Italy Pavilion’s “Hangar of Knowledge” by MCA – Mario Cucinella Architects. This architectural space merges ingenuity, manufacturing, and imagination in keeping with the Expo’s theme: Designing Future Societies for our Lives.

“Bringing the SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection 1998 – 2025 Exhibition to the Italian Pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka allows us to showcase the best of Italian manufacturing excellence and international and industrial creativity to the Asian public in general, and to Japan in particular… Many Japanese designers are involved, including Nendo, Nao Tamura, Makoto Kawamoto, and Yuri Himuro. The Expo will feature a vibrant selection from the SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection, which now comprises over 400 products,” says Ambassador Mario Vattani, Commissioner General for Italy at Expo 2025 Osaka.

The SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection, with over 400 products, is housed at the Artwood Academy in Lentate sul Seveso, Brianza, a school, archive, and workshop for Italy’s wood-furniture supply chain. Following its first international outing in Hong Kong in 2024, the Osaka exhibition marks another step in its global journey, responding to invitations from cultural institutions worldwide.

It is, as always, a narrative through objects, demonstrating that the future of design is forged when talent and industry meet to imagine and build a better world.

Details of SaloneSatellite Permanent Collection 1998 – 2025 Exhibition:

Location: Italian Pavilion, Expo 2025 Osaka

Dates: 7th-20th September 2025
Curated by: Marva Griffin Wilshire, Founder and Curator, SaloneSatellite
Exhibition and Graphic Design: Ricardo Bello Dias with Hariadna Pinate
Project Coordinator, Consultant: Porzia Bergamasco
Organising Secretariat: Chiara Ghilardi