Cover The Future Impact 3: Design Nation showcase at Milan Design Week was part of Singapore’s 60th anniversary celebrations
The Future Impact 3: Design Nation showcase at Milan Design Week was part of Singapore’s 60th anniversary celebrations
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‘Future Impact 3: Design Nation’, Singapore’s showcase at Milan Design Week 2025, charted the Republic’s emergence as a Nation by Design through three compelling acts: reflecting on its past, responding to the present, and reimagining the future
Leave it to Singapore to turn a cathedral into a case study in national imagination. Set within the soaring nave of Chiesa di San Bernardino alle Monache—a vaulted church in Milan’s Cinque Vie district, once part of a Benedictine convent, now a quietly resonant venue at which sacred architecture often meets contemporary design—Future Impact 3: Design Nation marked Singapore’s 2025 return to Milan Design Week with thoughtful ambition. It is one of the many celebrations taking place this year to mark the nation’s 60th birthday,
Curated by returning duo Tony Chambers and Maria Cristina Didero, with a new associate, Singaporean designer Hunn Wai, the exhibition was structured in three parts that represent Singapore’s design journey across time: Little Island of Brave Ideas revisits design’s role in nation-building; Future Impact captures current responses to contemporary challenges; and Virtuoso Visionaires projects future possibilities through the work of emerging talents.
Read more: 8 most theatrical moments from Milan Design Week 2025
Above The exhibition was held at the Chiesa di San Bernardino alle Monache church
The exhibition was held at the Chiesa di San Bernardino alle Monache church
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Above The three exhibition curators, the returning Maria Cristina Didero (left) and Tony Chambers (right) and this year’s newcomer Hunn Wai (middle)
Above The Future Impact team in Milan, clockwise from back row left: Werable’s Claudia Poh, Nice Project’s Sacha Leong, Olivia Lee, Tiah Nan Chyuan from Farm, clinical associate professor Lee Shu Woan from Changi General Hospital, Shi Yanjie from Vouse, Practice Theory’s Randy Yeo, Supermama’s John Tay, and Bewilder’s Ng Sze Kiat
The three exhibition curators, the returning Maria Cristina Didero (left) and Tony Chambers (right) and this year’s newcomer Hunn Wai (middle)
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Without natural resources, branding has played a crucial role in the Little Red Dot’s nation building. Design icons—from internationally recognised symbols like Pierre Balmain’s sarong kebaya uniform for Singapore Airlines and the souvenir-spawning Merlion, to hyper-local touchstones like the Courtesy Campaign and the colour-coded hawker centre tableware—have helped define how Singapore is seen from both within and beyond its shores.
The first part of the exhibition at Milan Design Week 2025 was a crash course in how design—and successful systems design in particular—has underpinned Singapore’s transformation, from pragmatic policies to imaginative placemaking—through visual culture, urban planning, and a future-oriented mindset.
Above Kintsugi 2.0 by Supermama at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
Above Fungariums in Space by Bewilder at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
Kintsugi 2.0 by Supermama at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
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Above Pnewmatics by Eian Siew at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
Above Celia by Kalinda Chen at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
Pnewmatics by Eian Siew at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
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The second part of the exhibition highlighted eight designers and studios whose work embodied the immediacy of design-led solutions. From inclusive fashion to algorithmic ceramics, and digital healthcare tools to upcycled furniture, these projects grappled with contemporary life—how we move, heal, consume and connect—while experimenting with new materials, systems and modes of making.
Highlights included Olivia Lee’s Matahari, a terracotta solar cooker that reimagines ancient Southeast Asian cookware to spark reflection on the sun as a futuristic energy source; a digital twin of Changi General Hospital’s (CGH) A&E department by Farm, Vouse and CGH, which uses real-time spatial modelling to optimise patient care without putting them at risk; Fungariums in Space by Bewilder, which brings medicinal mushroom cultivation into sleek, stainless-steel biodesign; and Supermama’s Kintsugi 2.0, which updates the traditional Japanese craft with 3D-printed gold resin and algorithmic forms, turning broken objects into whole futuristic heirlooms.
Above Matahari by Olivia Lee at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
Above Leave it to Singapore to turn a cathedral into a case study in national imagination
Matahari by Olivia Lee at the 'Future Impact 3: Design Nation' exhibition
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The final part of the Singapore exhibition at Milan Design Week 2025 captured the speculative energy of Singapore’s emerging design voices. Six young designers presented works that pushed the boundaries of material use, identity, and narrative. These included Pnewmatics by Eian Siew—an exploration of inflatable medical braces and air-based joinery systems that rethink structure, comfort and care; Celia by Kalinda Chen, a mycelium-based air purifier that merges biophilic design with fungal intelligence; and Standard Singlish by CJ Tan, a typographic system that turns colloquial vernacular into structured visual language.
Imaginative yet simultaneously grounded, these projects showcased how a new generation is using design to question norms, activate culture and anticipate new modes of living. As co-curator Wai notes: “Singapore is well-known for thriving through ingenuity and resourcefulness and now, the future lies with the new generation of globally attuned, self-aware innovators who can continue this legacy."
Credits
Images: Mark Cocksedge
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Jakarta-born, Bandung-raised and Singapore-based, Asih Jenie trained in Visual Communication Design at Bandung Institute of Technology and Architecture at Parahyangan Catholic University. She brings both rigour and heart to design journalism, infused with a distinct Southeast Asian voice.
As a child, she doodled on the edges of her schoolbooks and never outgrew her fascination with all things well-made and well-told. Her 15-year career spans editorial roles and bylines in Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong and Australia, across spatial design titles such as Dwell Asia, Cubes, Design Anthology, Habitus Living, and Home & Decor.
After a brief stint in public relations, she returned to publishing in 2023 to lead Tatler Homes Singapore, where she continues to tell stories about how we shape the spaces that shape us.
