Organized by WOW! together with Dieffebi at the opening ceremony of their new showroom in Milan, the panel discussion “Office Design Ibrido” was an official event of the last #DesigncityMilano that has opened new perspectives on the hybrid design. Nowadays everything is getting hybrid: spaces, objects and furniture, mixing together different functions and features, trying to cope with a more flexible and fluid lifestyle and work style.

Hydridization is one of the keywords of the contemporary design. It is the “grey area” of the project, as it was defined by the designer Giulio Iacchetti. “Grey is not something negative as sometimes we use to think: it is the mix of the three primary colors”. Presenting his new project, the Smart Writing Desk by Moleskine, Giulio Iacchetti has focused on the constant research of the contemporary design, far away from the super-specialized object, keen to join together the traditional objects with the new technological innovations.
This is the kind of research capable of rediscover the potential of these object, like a notebook (Paper Tablet by Giulio Iacchetti), a pen, which a digital company like Microsoft has found to be still extremely useful in a learning and creative process, and a aluminum paper, that the company e-wenco has turned into an autonomous heating and cooking system in their Notecook.
As Claudia Bonatti, manager of Microsoft’s office division, said, the technology is the real driver in these design revolution, changing everyone’s ways of working and living and therefore bringing changes in interaction between the company and the consumers and in the way of thinking, designing and producing the product.

How is it possible to face the challenges of this new trend? The 40 years Dieffebi’s history, told by the president Alberto De Zan, shows how a company can renovate itself, trying ceaselessly to find and add new hybrid solutions for their products, in order to satisfy the always new consumer’s needings. An example of this way of thinking is in the new products as the seat-cabinets CBox, design to allow the user to have always the important files or objects at his fingertips, or the soundproof bookcases Primo 1000 acoustic. Products like these are perfect for the new office spaces, like the ones Cesare Chichi by 967 has shown during his speech, tracing the hybrid scenario of the contemporary office, “from the paper to the digital and comeback”, form the home office to the home “in” office, till the hybridization between the desk and the urban space.
Text by Gabriele Masi.