Italian architect Giuseppe Porcelli sought to bend gender norms when transforming this Milanese apartment into an “intimate homoerotic” backdrop for his inaugural furniture collection.
Porcelli’s interior scheme was influenced by the history of garçonnières or bachelor pads – traditionally masculine apartments inhabited by single heterosexual men.
As part of Milan design week, the architect temporarily redecorated the Città Studi apartment housing his office to reimagine this gender-normative concept and share his own take on the stereotype.
“The garçonnière is one of those words that’s still used to refer to a studio apartment,” explained Porcelli.
“I found it interesting that a word to define that space refers to a hideaway where men used to have their secret love affairs with women,” he told Dezeen.
“This concept tickled my brain somehow, but I wanted to make it more personal and approach it from a gay perspective. So not only design a place for private, intimate meetings but also decorate it in a personal way, reflecting taste as well as status.”
Porcelli’s apartment formed a backdrop for his debut capsule furniture collection, designed to loosen the rigidity between typically masculine and feminine tropes.
Concealed behind heavy Venetian drapery, the pieces included a squat faux tortoiseshell plexiglass lamp crowned by a shaggy silk lampshade.
Glossy lacquered wood was paired with uncoated brushed solid brass to form a low-slung console table, while Porcelli applied a mixture of cotton, bamboo and gold-plated metal to an armchair characterised by a distinctly modernist form.
“Like two sides of the same coin, masculinity and femininity create a balance of unexpected juxtapositions,” said Porcelli. “Solid-looking volumes are flawed with tassels, ruches and bamboo details, redefining boundaries.”
The floor was fitted with an aubergine-hued carpet, serving as a colourful accent to various framed and wall-mounted artworks celebrating the male body.
A petite leopard-print lamp illuminated the wrought iron bed, which was topped with gold-accented cylindrical throw cushions.
Porcelli, who founded his eponymous interior design studio in 2021, debuted the “intimate homoerotic” apartment during last month’s Milan design week before dismantling the project.
“Unfortunately, we had to bring it back to what it was before, as developing interiors requires a proper office with printers, ugly but comfortable chairs, laptops and a lot of samples,” he reflected.
“But we kept a few improvements, like the carpet, the window curtains with the fringes at the bottom and the new colour on the walls at the entrance – a pleasant memory of that exciting week.”
Porcelli’s project was among a line-up of apartments that opened their doors for Milan design week. Elsewhere in the Italian city, local design studio Formafantasma staged an alternative three-act play presenting a critical perspective on modernism and its legacy.
The photography is by Silvia Rivoltella.
Milan design week took place from April 7 to 13. See Dezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.
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