Born in the province of Varese, Rossana Orlandi studied at Marangoni in Milan and began working in fashion, creating textiles for the greatest designers, from Kenzo to Armani. She come into contact with the world of design and in 2002 she decide to embark on a new career by opening her own gallery in the Magenta area, which has now become the Mecca for this sector.

She travels all over the world, attending design weeks and ateliers and begins to “adopt” and exhibit emerging artists. Demonstrating an exceptional flair, a mixture of sense and sensibility, all the names she chooses achieve great success, thus quickly earning her a reputation as a design “guru”, capable of predicting future trends.

Design must not only be conceived as an ideal of beauty, but also as a means of spreading positive values by changing the trends of thought.

(Rossana Orlandi)

Today the Rossana Orlandi Gallery, and in particular the wonderful garden with the pergola surrounded by a centennial strawberry grape plant, is the undisputed protagonist of every Salone del Mobile, the “home” of design lovers from all over the world.

Once inside, it reveals its soul of industrial archeology by unfolding in large rooms with huge windows full of wonderful objects that magically interact with each other, creating a sort of contemporary wunderkammer. The spaces, over 2500 square meters, once occupied the ties and scarves factory founded in 1882 by Hermann Prochownick. A historical legacy, linked to the world of manufacturing, which Rossana did not want to forget, but rather to enhance by keeping all the brown boxes that contained the products on the walls of the large showroom on the first floor, making them her archive.

Wandering through the various rooms, it is easy to see the “proof” of her visionary genius, just look at the colored lamps by Alvaro Catalàn de Ocòn made in 2011 with recycled plastic bottles and woven by Colombian artisans, today a furnishing trend, or the elegant chairs by Nika Zupanc from 2015 or those by Jaime Hayon from 2011 which anticipated the 30s interior Déco trend.

Among the novelties of 2022, it is impossible not to fall in love with the marvelous furnishing accessories in resin and gilded brass by Jean Yves Lanvin or with the sculptures by Sergio Roger, made of ancient natural linen and inspired by Greco-Roman art and its divinities, or with the chandelier by Diederik Schneemann, an artist who starts from an object rethinking it in other “lives”, made with dozens of perfume bottles.

Craftsmanship, harmony, witty irony, but also a commitment to creating Beauty in a future made uncertain by the hand of man himself. Rossana Orlandi is, in fact, today particularly engaged in the enhancement of works and artists who use recycled materials, primarily plastic, to raise public awareness on the issue of sustainability. Like the beautiful corals of FeUSE, generated from the waste of the production of electric furnace steel, a symbol to make us reflect on the disappearance of many marine species due to the rise in sea temperature.

The Rossana Orlandi Gallery is open to visits, preferably by reservation, and if you want to stay in her world even for a culinary break, you can book at the Aimo e Nadia BistRo, located right next door in via Matteo Bandello, which Rossana he decorated herself.

The Secret

Rossana Orlandi not only dictates trends in design, but also in fashion. Like her signature large white glasses that, tickled by always being asked where she bought them, she finally put into production in 2015 and are purchasable in her gallery.

Info utili

Galleria Rossana Orlandi
Via Matteo Bandello 14
20123 Milano
Tel. +39 02 4674471