Be the Project

“Be the Project” is the theme chosen for Fuorisalone 2026: an invitation to rediscover design as a dynamic and responsible process, where the human being returns to the center as an interpreter of change. A reflection that continues the journey started in recent years - from Tra Spazio e Tempo (2022) to Laboratorio Futuro (2023), from Materia Natura (2024) to Mondi Connessi (2025) - and now leads to a more conscious vision, where designing becomes, above all, a way of being.

“Be the Project” means recognizing that every creative act takes shape through the dialogue between thought and matter, between intuition and responsibility. It is not the finished form that defines the value of design, but the process that generates it: listening, error, transformation. In this sense, mistakes and failures become an integral part of design research - moments when an idea confronts reality and discovers new possible directions. It is in the attempt, in the possibility of getting it wrong, that the project becomes human and finds meaning.

At the same time, “Be the Project” is also an opportunity to rediscover the depth of making. In an age dominated by speed and constant production, design once again becomes a space for knowledge, slowness, and dialogue - between hands, materials, and cultures; between those who imagine and those who create; between memory and innovation. Within this framework, the theme also explores the relationship between human beings and new intelligences - not only human, but artificial, distributed, and non-linear. AI is not an alternative but an otherness to engage with: a presence that amplifies, questions, and challenges. “Be the Project” invites us to inhabit this hybrid relationship, where human intuition and algorithmic logic coexist, generating new, shared forms of creativity.

Designing, then, is not only about giving shape to something, but allowing oneself to be shaped by it. It is a reciprocal movement, an exchange of energy between the person and their work: what we put into the project - time, thought, care - returns to us as knowledge, connection, and vision.
Fuorisalone chooses to tell exactly this: design as a profound experience, an ethical and poetic act capable of imagining sustainable, inclusive, and conscious futures. “Be the Project” is not just a theme, but a perspective - an invitation to recognize ourselves in change, in process, and in the courage to keep trying.