Jasmine Serrurier reports from the Milan Furniture Fair.

Wednesday, April 16

"I'm very open to crossovers," announced Alasdhair Willis, CEO of Established & Sons and Stella McCartney's better half. He hasn't teamed up with his wife on the business front yet (though he was wearing a bespoke jacket made for him by her design house's tailor), but Willis was showing off another collaboration: a table with the thinnest top (1 mm) ever devised, created by John Barnard of Formula One.

Over at Armani, the 2008-2009 home collection had the reassuringly familiar thread of Japanese and Chinese design elements, with beige and black lacquer in 1930's shapes predominating. When pressed on whether there is a conscious link between his creative and business interests, both of which currently point eastward, Armani was quick to point out, "I am always very coherent with my own taste, and I don't let business influence my own creativity. I share with these cultures an aesthetic appreciation of understated elegance and sophistication."

Sitting down and talking shop with the Missoni family, who are as cozy as one of their woolly cardigans, is a pleasure. For 2008, Missoni stripes have given way to parrot tulips. "Flowers represent the figurative in our iconography," explained Luca Missoni. "This season's graphic had been collecting dust in our archive for the past 15 years," his mother, Rosita, continued. "Back then it had too many colorways, and would have been too expensive. Today everything is digital, and elaborate patterns can be created on anything in a much cheaper way. I could print this on my face if I wanted to do so!"