Copenhagen’s annual design festival, 3daysofdesign, returns in 2025 with the theme KEEP IT REAL, highlighting individuality, openness, and originality. Taking place across eight design districts in venues such as showrooms, shops, galleries, and public spaces, the festival showcases iconic furniture, lighting, accessories, and innovative materials.

In 2024, over 400 brands exhibited, drawing more than 45,000 visitors to over 500 events. The 2025 visual identity was created by Swedish graphic artist Andreas Samuelsson. 3daysofdesign

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The 63rd edition of the Salone del Mobile in Milan will host over 2,000 exhibitors from 37 countries, showcasing 148 first-time and returning brands across 169,000 sq m. Additionally, the Euroluce Biennial will return, featuring more than 300 brands from 25 countries, and SaloneSatellite will highlight 700 young designers under 35 along with 20 international design schools and universities.

The theme for this year’s event is ‘Building Worlds Fit for the Future’, emphasizing sustainable innovation, industrial manufacturing, and emotional intelligence. Image of Communication Campaign 2025 ‘Thought for Humans.’ Concept by Dentsu Creative Italy © Bill Durgin

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Frieze New York returns to The Shed in New York, featuring over 65 leading galleries from 25+ countries, including Gagosian, White Cube, and David Zwirner. The fair’s Focus section spotlights 12 emerging galleries, each showing solo presentations from emerging or under appreicated artists.

Across the city, the Frieze Week program includes major exhibitions at MoMA, the Whitney, and the Guggenheim.  Photo by Casey Kelbaugh. Courtesy of Frieze and CKA. Frieze New York

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RIBA’s new exhibition explores over 20 ambitious projects that overcame extreme site challenges across Britain. Featuring work by architects like Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, Neave Brown, and Lord Norman Foster, alongside contemporary firms such as Caruso St John, Tonkin Liu and Carmody Groarke, it highlights innovation in design, materials, and engineering.

Divided into three themes, Difficult Landscapes, Difficult Urban Spaces, and Difficult Reworkings, the exhibition showcases projects like Creek Vean House, The Eden Project, Alexandra Road Estate, and The British Library. Through models, drawings, and photography, visitors can see how architects turned difficult sites into groundbreaking designs. Image of the interior of Astley Castle, an example of ‘Difficult Reworkings’ in the RIBA exhibition. Architects Witherford Watson Mann. © Helene Binet. RIBA

Difficult Urban Spaces

Difficult Landscapes

Difficult Reworkings

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The International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF) in 2025 celebrates global design under the theme ‘Designing in Harmony’, which emphasizes human-centered, sustainable, and multicultural creativity. The fair introduces a refreshed floor plan, expanded international participation, and new immersive experiences, including exhibits, talks, and networking opportunities. 

Key highlights include the launch of Morpho by Tomorrowland and Ethnicraft, The Library x Phaidon featuring Defining Style: The Book of Interior Design, and global exhibitors from Belgium, Japan, and the UK, alongside dedicated spaces such as The Bespoke Salon with Architectural Digest and The Water Experience x Grohe. ICFF

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Stockholm Design Week 2025, organized by Stockholm Furniture Fair, will feature events, exhibitions, and open showrooms across the city. Stockholm Furniture Fair, Scandinavia’s leading platform for furniture and lighting design, will host exhibitors, stage programs, and industry discussions.

The event connects professionals, industry insiders, and the public, fostering networking, product launches, and new ideas to advance the Scandinavian design industry. Image artwork by Kustaa Saksi as the Guest Creative for the 2025 edition. Stockholm Design Week. Stockholm Furniture Fair

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The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMA) announces Naoto Fukasawa: Things in Themselves, the first major US exhibition celebrating the career of renowned Japanese designer Naoto Fukasawa. The exhibition will coincide with Fukasawa receiving the 2024 Collab Design Excellence Award on December 12. Things in Themselves will showcase Fukasawa’s minimalist and user-centered design philosophy, presenting production designs alongside working sketches and models.

Best known for his role as design director at MUJI and collaborations with global brands, Fukasawa’s work spans electronics, furniture, and industrial design. The exhibition will explore his key concepts, including “super normal” and “without thought,” which emphasize intuitive interactions with objects. Featuring pieces from the PMA’s collection, international loans, and studio archives, Things in Themselves highlights Fukasawa’s influence on contemporary design. Image of Shelf X / B&B Italia, courtesy of B&B Italia. Philadelphia Museum of Art

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The 11th edition of the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam in 2024, themed ‘Nature of Hope,’ focuses on how architecture can restore ecological balance by prioritizing biodiversity and nature. The event will feature an exhibition at the Nieuwe Instituut, a public program, and Botanical Monuments showcasing green spaces in Rotterdam.

The program includes a variety of activities such as lectures, workshops, and excursions, aimed at integrating existing knowledge with transformative design practices. Curated by a diverse team of architects and researchers, ‘Nature of Hope’ emphasizes the urgent need to align human practices with the well-being of the planet and its inhabitants. Photo by Jacqueline Fuijkschot. IABR

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The third edition of Zurich Design Weeks is centered on the theme of ‘GOOD NEWS,’ aiming to highlight positive developments in design over a three-week period. The event seeks to counteract our natural tendency to focus on negative news by showcasing progress, sustainable ideas, and innovations that inspire optimism. It emphasizes design’s role as a problem-solving discipline that can create solutions to pressing global issues, making the world more sustainable, beautiful, and efficient.

In 2023, Zurich Design Weeks, the largest design event in Switzerland, attracted nearly 25,000 visitors with a schedule of exhibitions, workshops, talks, and social events. Key partners for the 2024 edition include the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich and neue räume 24. © Zurich Design Weeks. Zurich Design Weeks

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The Tropical Modernism: Architecture and Independence exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London explores the architectural styles of tropical modernism in West Africa and India. In the late 1940s, British architects Jane Drew and Maxwell Fry adapted a modern aesthetic valuing function over ornament and applied this to the hot, humid conditions of West Africa.

Following independence, the prime ministers of India and Ghana commissioned major new projects in this style as a symbol of internationalism and progressiveness. The exhibition celebrates the styles created by national architects, who emphasized local context, creating alternative styles of modernism.

Tropical Modernism, despite its colonial associations, became an architectural symbol of a post-colonial future. The exhibition highlights architecture and modernism’s role in decolonisation and constructing national identity.

Image is a film still of Unity Hall, KNUST, Kumasi by John Owuso Addo and Miro Marasović – for ‘Tropical Modernism – Architecture and Independence’ © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. V&A

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