belmond train | the new celia experience

H&M Home.

Dusty 17th-century floorboards and ochre Baroque palazzo walls might seem an unlikely home for a high-street giant, yet Milan has a way of making contradictions feel incredibly natural. Palazzo Acerbi’s ancient rooms, once famous for the wild parties of a 17th-century Marquess, now house the much-anticipated collaboration between H&M Home and Kelly Wearstler. Marking a double debut for both the brand and the designer at Salone del Mobile, the installation offers a look at 29 pieces of furniture, lighting and decorative objects, showcasing a departure from the small-scale accessories that defined the brand since 2009. Schön! walked through the space guided by Evelina Kravaev-Söderberg, the creative lead at H&M Home, for a first look at the collaboration.

Modern silhouettes sit against a backdrop of historic frescoes, creating a friction that Kravaev-Söderberg found irresistible. “We wanted to showcase our very contemporary products in this older environment because we’ve talked a lot about the interesting connection between the past and the present,” she says.

H&M Home.

Out of the 29 items that make up the full range, nine hero pieces lead the narrative in Milan. Emera table lamps appear in reimagined, floor-scale proportions to lead visitors toward the dining room, where Noxen chairs sit atop silver mirrored plinths. Reflections dance across raw, historic walls, creating a conversation between the ornate permanence of the palazzo and the contemporary shapes of the furniture. Mirrors work to destabilise the space, making the heavy solid wood feel as though it might be floating. Here, custom music fill the rooms, ensuring visitors experience the collection through every sense as they move through the historic space.

Two shutter box cabanas house the Aurex lamp, an object defined by its silhouette and framed like a piece of art within a vitrine. Light projections move through the shutters to animate the walls while custom music fills the air, ensuring every sense is engaged. Moving into the lounge, the Soluna lounge chair and Poma accent chair are stacked and layered against striped wallpaper. “My approach to design is always the same. It’s more intricate, of course, to do the furniture; it needs to hold a human body. There are different purposes but a similar passion put into every object,” she explains.

H&M Home.

Patterns deepen in the floral room, where the softly contoured Curva vase takes a position of prominence. Vintage floral wallpapers and bronze mirrors reflect a space filled with live flowers and a plush carpet, creating a warm, enveloping atmosphere. Solid wood chairs with geometrical silhouettes take over the dining room, designed to function as both seating and standalone art. Vintage wallpapers, selected by Wearstler herself and blown up to a larger scale, line the walls to give the illusion that the installation has always existed within the historic building.

The final room introduces the Mona clothing rack, finished in a high-gloss red that stands out against pink and green walls. Printed garment bags suggest a narrative that extends beyond the room, while a custom scent by Side Hustle – heavy with notes of orange flower, jasmine, and Palo Santo – drifts through every corner.

H&M Home.

Modularity defines the larger items, particularly the Avern armchairs and the circular Ortra sofa table that can be configured to fit various living spaces. Creative solutions emerged from the practicalities of a global retailer, ensuring items can be transported easily. “Modularity is the main theme here in Salone [del Mobile]. We have restrictions at H&M when it comes to sizing and weight, so we had to figure all that out,” Kravaev-Söderberg says.

Working with Kelly Wearstler meant navigating a year of renderings and development to ensure the quality met the designer’s high standards. Wearstler, renowned for her West Coast maximalism and her work on luxury Proper Hotels, brings a Californian soul to the Swedish brand. Wearstler’s Californian aesthetic finds a partner in a neutral colour palette that feels timeless and accessible.

H&M Home.

A three-day session in Stockholm served as the catalyst for the partnership, where screens were abandoned in favour of material samples and printed references. Kravaev-Söderberg still recalls the energy of their sessions. “[Wearstler] She’s inspired us a lot with raising the bar and just never being satisfied,” she says. “We actually printed out things and talked about colours sitting on the floor.” 

Backgrounds and heritage inform every choice Kravaev-Söderberg makes, from her roots in Sofia, Bulgaria, to her studies in Paris and life in Stockholm. A multicultural perspective helps her design for an international audience with varied tastes. “Bulgaria and Sweden are completely different, but I think also that’s why I love to work for an international company,” she says. 

Such a balanced outlook ensures the assortment can offer both minimalist geometry and more decorative ornamentation without losing its identity. “In a way, we are all the same and in many other ways we’re not, so it’s easy to find this balance and diversity also within our assortment,” Kravaev-Söderberg says. “H&M Home is not about one style; we try to make one assortment for different tastes and different aesthetics.”

H&M Home.

Balancing beauty and utility remains the priority for H&M, ensuring every object answers a purpose which can shape how people live. “I hope that they [the consumers] will understand the concept of modularity and that they will have a feeling to play around in their home, because that’s what you actually can do with a modular assortment.”

The ultimate goal for the design team is to create items that hold emotional value. “The home, I think, is the most personal thing around you,” says Kravaev-Söderberg. “It’s a space where you really can be yourself and relax. To me, the home is my sanctuary still.”

Visitors to Milan can view the collection until the end of April, before the official launch in stores on September 3rd. Discover more here.

photography. courtesy of H&M Home
words. Gennaro Costanzo

Miroslav Sekulić-Struja.

This spring, Louis Vuitton expands its library of global explorations with a new arrival that marks the first time the collection visits our beloved city, Berlin. Since 2010, the Travel Book collection has invited artists to territories they have never experienced to capture the unfiltered emotions of a first encounter. 

Authors explore unknown cultures and architectures to share a version of a city that feels personal rather than objective. Every page acts as a mirror to contemporary creation through a variety of mediums ranging from oil and watercolour to digital pixels. Berlin joins previous destinations like Gabriella Giandelli’s Australia from 2021 and Miles Hyman’s 2018 study of Rome.

Miroslav Sekulić-Struja takes the lead for the latest release, drawing on a lifetime of movement between Croatia and Germany. Born in the industrial port of Rijeka, the Croatian artist carries the nickname ‘Struja,’ meaning ‘electric,’ in reference to his hyperactive teenage years spent with spiky hair and animated eyes. 

Miroslav Sekulić-Struja.

Miroslav Sekulić-Struja.

In this version, the artist focuses on two characters whose paths cross amid layers of memory, pain and healing. Berlin appears as a landscape of recovery, seen through the eyes of an illustrator who once used drawing as a refuge from surrounding violence. Across 116 drawings, the pages come alive through pencilled, painted or hatched surfaces. Every page invites a look at the world through a new lens, guided by the instincts of an artist acting as a trailblazing scout. Sekulić-Struja captures the city’s spirit by portraying the provincial life and tender moments he encounters, from heartfelt hugs in the street to quiet walks with dogs.

Growing up in the Baden-Württemberg region, Sekulić-Struja’s youth was marked by the world of German comics – specifically the mischiefs of ‘Max und Moritz,’ a children’s book by the German poet and illustrator Wilhelm Busch. Later on, he approached the classics like the ‘Astérix’ series and the adventures of the odd-ball duo of Spanish secret agents ‘Mortadelo and Filemón.’ Influences from Italian neorealist cinema helped shape his approach to the German capital. Before finding his path in art, Sekulić-Struja trained as a chef and worked as a tattoo artist and a poet for love letters during his military service. 

Visitors to the Festival du Dessin in Arles can view original drawings from the Berlin book alongside works by Giandelli and Hyman between April and May 2026. Collectors find a range of choices, from the standard edition to a large-format version featuring illustrations printed in six colours with silk-screened hardback covers. For the most dedicated, a highly exclusive edition limited to 30 copies comes bound in leather and housed in a slipcase traditionally crafted in Padua. This rare version also includes a signed lithograph printed at the Atelier Michael Woolworth in Paris, offering a tangible piece of the artist’s journey.

Miroslav Sekulić-Struja.

Miroslav Sekulić-Struja.

Discover more here.

photography. courtesy of Louis Vuitton
words. Gennaro Costanzo

Hartmut Nägele.

Spring always brings a flurry of fresh design news, but the latest dispatch from the German furniture powerhouse Thonet demands immediate attention. Fashion icon Jil Sander has once again turned her exacting eye to the realm of interior design, expanding her highly successful JS. Thonet signature collection for 2026. “Creativity is simply a part of my life,” she says, as she adds the S 411 lounge chair, its accompanying footstool and the sweeping S 1070 table to the lineup. Enthusiasts could already catch an early glimpse of the new pieces at the Neue Werkstätten during the Munich Design Days, before the official global rollout in early May.

Revisiting a classic requires a careful touch. “I wasn’t interested in completely redesigning these classics,” Sander explains. “It was more about taking them to the next level.” Taking inspiration from the mirror finish of a Steinway piano and the rich leather found in vintage English motorcars, she has entirely reimagined the tubular steel frames. Two distinct aesthetic paths define the collection, appropriately named ‘SERIOUS’ and ‘NORDIC.’ 

Fabian Frinzel. Hartmut Nägele.

SERIOUS replaces traditional chrome with a smoky, titanium-coloured finish, pairing the metal with high-shine lacquered wood and deep leather tones like Graphite Ruby Red and Graphite Green. Meanwhile, NORDIC takes a softer route, utilising a matt nickel-silver finish alongside white-pigmented oak and leathers in shades of Light Caramel and Alabaster White.

Speaking on the NORDIC line, Sander notes that the matt nickel-silver frame has a uniquely warm aura. She previously relied on satin nickel-silver for the metalwork in her flagship fashion boutiques worldwide, claiming that it acts as a structural backbone for creating an atmosphere of understated luxury. “For me, the colour tones are like notes that speak to each other and make each other resonate,” she says, ensuring every choice harmonises with the surrounding materials.

Hartmut Nägele.

The newly added S 411 lounge chair dates back to a 1932 Thonet factory design, originally marking a shift towards more voluminous, comfortable seating. “I wanted to achieve this lightness without chrome reflections and at the same time ground the S 411,” Sander says. Fully upholstered in premium leather and finished with a singular piping detail, the chair boasts an incredibly clean, monolithic look.

Hartmut Nägele.

Dining spaces receive equal attention with the introduction of the S 1070 table, a piece originally conceived by Glen Oliver Löw in 2004. Measuring a generous 220×100 centimetres, the table features a longitudinally divided top that allows for intriguing two-tone colour combinations. A matching B 97 side table completes the arrangement, updated with stunning marble tops. 

Earlier last month, Thonet formally donated two of the S 64 chairs from the SERIOUS line to Die Neue Sammlung – The Design Museum at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich.

Hartmut Nägele.

Discover more here. 

photography. courtesy of Thonet, Fabian Frinzel, Hartmut Nägele
words. Gennaro Costanzo