May 24, 2018

Text: Jesse Dorris

Shulman + Associates Gives Istituto Marangoni a Fashion-Forward Home in Miami

Classroom stools are by Magis. Photography by Emilio Collavino.

In 1935, Giulio Marangoni founded his Istituto Marangoni with an eye toward establishing Milan as a fashion capital. Alumni including Franco Moschino went on to do just that. Now, the venerable institution has opened a location in the Miami Design District, with interiors as fashion-forward as its faculty.

The school’s lobby features Alcantara microfiber and Marcel Wanders’s Dalia seating for Cappellini. Photography by Emilio Collavino.
Shulman + Associates completed a 90-foot-tall addition to the original building, keeping its stucco facade. Photography courtesy of Istituto Marangoni Miami.
Jasper Morrison’s Tate Color seats for Cappellini decorate the classrooms. Photography by Emilio Collavino.

The school is unmissable, housed within Shulman + Associates’s Billboard Building. “We designed a slender glass tower that embraces a smaller historic building, with the wrapper forming a commercial billboard that faces the highway corridor on one side, ” says principal Allan Shulman. “An art-wall, curated by the Institute for Contemporary Art, faces the Design District on the other.”

Durable vinyl tiles from Bolon serves as flooring. Photography by Emilio Collavino.
Custom window frames allow maximum natural light for exhibitions. Photography by Emilio Collavino.

In a nod to another important Italian brand, the institute chose Cappellini to furnish the campus, placing pieces by Giulio Cappellini, Marcel Wanders, and Joe Colombo throughout classrooms and common spaces to remind students of the legacy they will carry into the 21st century.             

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