Delizie. Edoardo Piermattei

Every year, the VIP Lounge of the fair takes form as a new project for discovery. The 2026 iteration places emphasis on the theme: fancy, inviting the artist Edoardo Piermattei to welcome guests into his imagination, with the capacity to transform a space and bring value to a context that exists in architectural tension, sheltered from the threat of decoration. The invitation to fancy, to imagine conditions different from our own, has been translated by Piermattei into the transformation of the lounge as an “elsewhere”. The lounge, titled Delizie, takes its name from the Medici pleasure villas: sites in which they indulged in a fictional leisure, that were actually devices of territorial control disguised as recreation. Likewise, the VIP Lounge becomes a hortus conclusus, suspended between the sacred character of the hortus and the nobility of gardens of power and ostentation. Delizie takes form thanks to the support of Krumiri Rossi 1878, a historic case of excellence in Italian baked goods, symbol of Casale Monferrato and recently included in the Compagnia del Gusto – an entrepreneurial project for the protection and appreciation of the finest Italian foods and wines – renewing its history and preserving the cultural and identity value of a brand rooted in the collective memory of our country. The installation also features three monumental works – Ninfeo, Delizia and Fontana triste – as well as Giudizio senza soggetto, a work composed of five panels in pigmented concrete, inspired by the angels of the Last Judgment by Pietro Cavallini. The three works develop the theme of dominion through melancholic and dysfunctional architectures: from the broken gateway of Ninfeo to the nature transformed into a design object in Delizia, all the way to the denied thrust of Fontana triste. In Giudizio senza soggetto, on the other hand, the wings of Cavallini’s angels seem to be absent from their bodies, leaving us with a judgment without a subject .

The works have been made thanks to the dialogue between the artist and Magnetti Building, a company that is a leader in the construction sector, and has supported the studio in all the phases of production. With the Spelonca Project, the artist has also designed the surfaces of the bar and its counter. The space is also characterized by the refined jacquard fabric that rethinks the furnishings in wrought iron, based on the encounter between Piermattei and Celeste Italia, a young company located on Lake Como driven by the passion and intensive knowledge of the excellent fabrics made in Italy. The design reinterprets an original watercolour by the artist and enhances the installation, creating a refined dialogue between art, material and manufacture.

The visitors’ experience on the opening day of the fair is completed by an edible work of architecture created by Piermattei, a tribute to the krumiro Rossi, the biscuit that represents the identity of Casale Monferrato, transforming it into the bricks that make up the form of Baroque architecture in Piedmont.