Diplomacy Journal David Kendall 기자 | On March 10, the Embassy of Italy in Seoul hosted the "10th Italian Design Day RE-DESIGN: The Regeneration of Space, Objects, Thought, and Relationships" at High Street Italia (HSI), the Italian Trade Agency (ITA)’s flagship showplace built on Gangnam’s famed Garosu-gil to promote products made in Italy.

Architect, designer and artist Michele De Lucchi was chosen to serve as the designated “Italian Design Day Ambassador.” The recipient of numerous awards and honors in both Europe and Asia, Mr. De Lucchi is a founding member of Milan-based AMDL CIRCLE, a creative multidisciplinary architecture and design studio. He is known for blending humanistic values and craftsmanship in items as small as a desk light and as major as a museum, railway station or bridge.

Before Mr. De Lucchi delivered his masterclass with the theme "Life is a Dance," the Italian Ambassador to Korea, Emilia Gatto, delivered her welcome remarks in Korean. She spoke about both nation’s strong appreciation for design and how their styles, though different, are complementary and mutually respected.

In his masterclass, Mr. De Lucchi broke down the progression of his career by decade, starting in the 1970s when he strove to move from conformist to radical design. He said that he struggled to decide if he should be an architect, designer, thinker or artist. In the end, he was pleased to report, he never decided and kept doing it all.

Each decade has an unmistakable spirit of the time, he declared, However, he prefers to use the German expression Zeitgeist, since a ghost is better at conjuring something that rose from the living. The only permanence alluded to was perpetual conflict between opposites: logic vs. emotion, perfection vs. imperfection, growth vs. sustainability. Without one it would be impossible to define the other, according to this master.

Sustainability weighs heavy on his mind in the present era, judging by his words and deeds. At Expo 2025 Osaka AMDL CIRCLE won the international design competition for the Nordic Pavilion, a timber structure built for disassembly and reuse. He described the process of building his own home, using quarried stone instead of concrete as the foundation and an entirely wooden structure held together by interlocking joints. He ultimately failed to banish plastic entirely after realizing it was needed for safely transmitting electricity through wires. That battle was another reminder of how flexibility and interaction with others are essential and how he came up with his theme “Life is a Dance.”   

While approximately 80 chairs were set out for the event, it was standing room only with a large group of mostly young students filling the back third of the hall. In the Q&A session that followed Mr. De Lucchi encouraged Korea's budding architects to be happy: “The world does not need sad architects.” He advised them to follow the advice he took from his mentor and go out, discover the world, find out who people are, what they want, and build what they need to make their lives better.

While conceding that the rapid pace of AI development and global conflict are disheartening, Mr. De Lucchi stressed the importance of embracing change, using it to improve life and “be happy.”

Throughout the month HSI will be holding events linked to Design Day. The showrooms on the first and second floors always display sleek and elegant designs, whether furniture, dishes or racing bikes. “They are for sale if people want,“ Ambassador Gatto explained after the lecture, “but the main thing is to raise awareness and make connections with Koreans and their designers. This was the first such Italian design house built overseas. It shows how important Korea is to Italian designers.”

From March 13 to April 10, HSI will hold “The Art of Cooking: Italian and Korean Kitchenware” exhibition “to explore the gastronomic cultures of Italy and South Korea through objects used for the preparation and tasting of traditional foods,” according to the brochure