MILAN — The 64th edition of Salone del Mobile.Milano and Milan Design Week 2026 will forever be linked to an era of tariffs, inflation, rising oil prices and conflict.
If Milan Design Week occupancy rates and hotel tariffs are any indicator, the design industry is booming. But the ongoing conflict in the Middle East and the closed Strait of Hormuz have cast a shadow over the week’s events, which start Monday and will close here Sunday.
Until now, European furniture and design firms have played a fierce game of defense while navigating the tricky playing field of geopolitics, trade and even a global pandemic. Quick to re-strategize, the industry has used its lobbying prowess to pioneer trade routes and carve out new markets.
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The Iran conflict, which ignited in late February and hit key luxury and design hubs like the UAE, including Dubai, and Riyadh adds another blow and will be top of mind for leaders as they prepare for the Salone del Mobile.Milano trade show.
“Regarding the Arab countries, from a medium-term perspective, they certainly retain interest for development. However, it depends greatly on how long this conflict lasts. Hopefully, common sense will prevail,” FederlegnoArredo president Claudio Feltrin told WWD in an interview during the Salone del Mobile.Milano preview lunch.
The 64th edition of the fair will open its doors at FieraMilano Rho trade grounds on Tuesday and will include two biennials — kitchen expo Euro Cucina and the International Bathroom Exhibition — as well as breakout designer debuts at the annual Salone Satellite curation.
Feltrin, like leaders of many firms here, is cautious on the outlook for 2026 and performance in the Middle East. Many are closely monitoring the situation.
“If the crisis subsides or is resolved, we could consider 2026 to be on track and more or less aligned with 2025. However, it’s clear that for now, we’re just observing, as there’s very little we can do to influence it,” Feltrin said.
Middle East Impact at a Glance
The Middle Eastern region accounted for 7 percent of the sector’s total exports. By the end of 2025, the region recorded an overall decline of 1.5 percent, despite positive contributions from the United Arab Emirates and Israel, which were not enough to offset the downturn in Saudi Arabia, to which exports from Italy plunged 19.7 percent. These results, from before the outbreak of the war, indicate that the area — excluding Saudi Arabia — grew by 3.3 percent in 2025, FederlegnoArredo said.
Re-mapping Strategy
At the dawn of U.S. President Trump’s penalizing trade policy, involving 15 percent tariffs on European imports, luxury firms here were counting on the Middle East market to offset losses from the U.S. Now that the tariff jitters have somewhat subsided and the market has gauged its impact, firms here are once again looking to the U.S. — whose luxury consumers continue to fuel demand of ultra-high-end design goods, to offset the impact of the ongoing war, which includes inflation and rising energy and shipping costs.
Prices of oil jumped above $100 a barrel on April 13. Inflation offers no reprieve. According to EU statistics bureau Eurostat, euro area annual inflation is expected to be 2.5 percent in March 2026, up from 1.9 percent in February, according to a flash estimate, still hovering around the historic highs reached after the brink of the Ukraine war.
Another thorny issue is the contract business. According to the 2025-26 branded real estate report by Savills, branded residences are being constructed at an unprecedented rate. Some of those hot spots happen to be Dubai and Abu Dhabi, though Miami is among the highest ranked globally.
Progress there is top of mind for companies throughout the sector. Design platforms like Artemest are also cautiously optimistic.
Until the dawn of the Iran conflict, until geopolitical tensions arose, the Middle East represented nearly 20 percent of Artemest’s sales, driven by hospitality and residential projects. “There’ll still be projects in the Middle East, less in Dubai maybe, but it’s gonna hurt a little bit,” CEO Marco Credendino noted.
Salone del Mobile.Milano so far is still planning a satellite fair in Riyadh for 2026. The sector’s biggest names — Molteni&C, Minotti, Cassina and Poltrona Frau among them — have invested in expanding their retail space in the Gulf to tap into the high-net-worth migration to the region over the past decade. It remains to be seen if that event will go ahead as planned.
The Rest of Europe
At the European level, the design sector comprised about 295,000 businesses in 2024, with total revenue reaching 31 billion euros, up 3.2 percent year on year, according to the Design Economy report released Thursday and carried out by Fondazione Symbola, Deloitte Private, POLI.design, and Italy’s ADI Industrial Design Association. Employment in the sector also shows positive growth, with over 356,000 workers, up 4.8 percent.
For French manufacturers, the Middle East is a strong market driven by construction, housing, and luxury demand, with a focus on Dubai and Saudi Arabia, said Isabelle Hernio, the international manager of the French Furniture Industry Ameublement. Ameublement français is one of the main pillars behind the Design Défilé, French for The Design Fashion Show, a collective of luxury furniture firms that will showcase the best in high-end French design here with a selection of 13 French heritage and contemporary houses and 53 furniture pieces.
The Middle East is a highly significant market for the French furniture industry due to its booming construction, housing, and luxury demand, particularly in Dubai and Saudi Arabia, she said, but concerns have been raised about rising shipping costs.
“Logistics is not that easy. It costs a lot to transport furniture pieces. That has nothing to do with fashion, cosmetics or tableware — furniture is heavy, and it is very expensive to export and to ship,” she said.
Roberto Xompero, the chief executive officer of Italian marble company Margraf, echoed this. “One is quite obvious: unfortunately, with the war in Iran and the issues related to transportation, it is becoming increasingly complicated to work with the Middle East. The number of ships transporting materials is much lower than before, and transportation costs have also risen significantly,” he said.
Margram has been extracting and processing premium marble since 1906. He leads the company’s strategic expansion in international markets — specifically the Middle East, China, and the U.S.
The ‘Unforcastable Year’
This year is what luxury linens maker Frette CEO Filippo Arnaboldi has coined an “unforecastable year.”
“It’s very difficult to understand the sentiment of the consumer due to all the geopolitical challenges that we are facing.
“Right now, the U.S. market is still the number-one market. It’s about 60 percent of our business. So market is still pretty stable despite everything that is happening in the world. And luckily enough, the so-called the GCC, the Gulf Countries market, is still a very small market for us.”
Colombini Group CEO Giovanni Battista Vacchi said the industry needs to be careful to concentrate on the big picture, the globe as a whole and areas of opportunity such as younger generations who are ever more interested in buying high-end furniture.
Colombini Group is home to Italian furniture-to-kitchens-maker Febal Casa, which counts Matteo Thun and Daniel Libeskind among its key design collaborators, is placing big bets on the U.S. market. The firm has recently expanded into new territories like South Africa, and Lagos, Nigeria.
“For 2026, we clearly need to somewhat isolate what is happening in the Middle East; otherwise, we risk focusing too much on short-term events — hopefully, they are short-term,” he said.
Angelo Monaco, CEO of design kitchens firm Arclinea, said that 2026 started off better than 2025. “Obviously, everything that has been happening in recent days is creating a bit more fog, a bit more uncertainty. It cannot be denied that this situation is troubling. However, looking at it from a quarterly perspective, the current situation is not, at this time, creating a barrier to our goals for 2026.”
Federlegno Arredo said the value of the wood supply chain reached 52.3 billion euros in 2025.
To ignite growth, Salone del Mobile.Milano organizers will unfurl a new initiative and a narrative installation in the form of an imaginary hotel that is intended to showcase new possibilities for luxury hospitality decor. The project has been conceived by Maison Numéro 20, the Parisian agency founded by Oscar Lucien Ono, a designer known for embracing Art Deco style who is considered a master of haute couture decoration. About 1,900 exhibits and around 300,000 visitors are expected at the fair.
Starting in September, the project will continue with an international tour of key markets, gradually building an international audience. In 2027, Salone Contract will be present as a structured, non-generalist exhibition, with companies selected for their design quality, industrial capacity and operational reliability.
