Caffè Populaire

« The concept for Caffè Populaire is to turn our shared values into a collaboration. To create down to earth, generous human encounters. A harmonious gathering of material, people and space. A place in which you feel humbled by the grand venue and the raw but refined materials within. This is the past and the present. Because after all, food is the oldest way to socialize and to host is to celebrate. This is not an instagram wall, or photobooth. In a sense, this is the anti-digital. » Sam, Frederick and Alberto (Lambert & Fils and DWA Design Studio)

The duo transforms the industrial backdrop of Milan’s Alcova building – a defunct panettone factory – into a café- bar inviting people to gather around a common table to share food and ideas.

DWA Design Studio reimagines Alcova as a multisensory space filled with installations from a collective of international talents. Montreal’s Lambert & Fils showcases two new contemporary lighting collections: Sainte and Hutchison. Dramatic forms fill the rooms of the factory and create a conversation of opposites – raw and refined, past and present.

A place of sanctuary during the hustle of Milan’s most widely attended design fair, rest and reprieve can be found at one of Caffè Populaire’s community tables over a breakfast panettone or an evening aperitivo.

Imagined by two design studios who share the ideal that design cannot exist without dialogue, Caffè Populaire creates an environment of potential, activated by those who inhabit it.