For Milan Design Week 2026, Missoni is not presenting a new collection or a concept store. It is presenting a machine. The Slow Art of Craft is an immersive installation at Via Solferino 9 in Milan, open to the public from April 21 to 26 between 11am and 10pm, built entirely around the Caperdoni, one of the most iconic and closely guarded tools in the maison’s creative heritage.
The Machine That Makes Missoni, Missoni
The Caperdoni machine is used exclusively by Missoni, preserved with care and not replicated elsewhere in the industry. The process begins by hand: artisans interlace between 600 and 1,200 threads to create bobbins, the foundational building blocks of the fabric. Those bobbins are then fed into the Caperdoni, which transforms the hand assembled, multicoloured spools into the richly textured, vibrant textile surfaces that have defined Missoni‘s visual identity for decades. The machine, by design, takes its time. According to Missoni, the Caperdoni loom produces just one and a half metres of textile per hour, a pace that is entirely intentional and central to the quality of the finished fabric.
A New Chapter for a Heritage Technique
The Design Week installation also marks a significant creative milestone for the brand: the introduction of Caperdoni fabric into Missoni‘s home category. Previously applied across knitwear and eveningwear, including designs incorporating lurex and sequins, the technique has now been adapted for interior use. The resulting collection includes poufs, throws, cushions, and accessories, extending the fabric’s distinctive chromatic and structural identity from the body to the living space, and signaling a meaningful expansion of Missoni‘s lifestyle universe.
Time, Material, and the Value of Slowness
At a moment when the fashion industry is increasingly measured by speed, Missoni is making a deliberate counter-argument. The installation at Via Solferino 9 places the relationship between time, material, and craft at the center of the conversation, not as nostalgia, but as creative direction. Manual artisan intervention remains integral throughout the Caperdoni process, with hands guiding the alignment and behavior of threads during weaving in a way that no automated system can replicate. It is a production model rooted in precision and patience, and Missoni is making no apologies for that.
Design Week as the Right Stage
Missoni‘s choice to present at Fuorisalone rather than within a traditional fashion context is a deliberate one. Milan Design Week has long been a space where craft, material, and process are not supporting details but the main event, and The Slow Art of Craft fits that framework perfectly. By foregrounding the Caperdoni process, the brand positions textile development as central to its creative direction, drawing a clear line from its established expertise in knitwear to its broader ambitions across fashion and interiors. For Missoni, this is not a departure from what the brand does; it is the clearest possible statement of how it does it.
