DESIGN WEEK, “BRAVERY BAR” IS BACK AMONG ISOLA DESIGN FESTIVAL'S PROTAGONISTS

Florence, March 6, 2025

During the Milan Design Week 2025 (7-13 April), IAAD., Accademia Italiana and SAE Institute - high education schools belonging to the AD Education circuit, an international reality comprising 21 design institutes attended by over 42,000 students - explore the future of inclusive design with the event  "BE AWARE: rethinking paralympic design", sponsored by the Italian Paralympic Committee and hosted within the now established and well-known format BRAVERY BAR in the context of the Basic Village Milano in Zona Farini. 

The event, realized with the partnership of Isola Design, celebrates inclusion, innovation and aims to use the creative lever of project action with the purpose of probing and challenge the limits of what is considered humanly possible, activating an intense collaborative dialogue between designers and Paralympic athletes on the useful and purposeful use of cutting-edge technologies. To curate all the contents of the event, the designer, entrepreneur and documentary filmmaker Danilo Ragona.

Through multidisciplinary workshops open to all, installations and performances, this new edition of the BRAVERY BAR - stage of 'La Nuova Intelligenza del Made in italy', research project by AD Education - explores a way of thinking and design that relates to the intention to overcome barriers and transform the concept of limit in an idea of opportunity. The event aims to stimulate reflection on the themes of diversity, of the inclusion and valorization of human capacities: athletes with different abilities assume in this context the role of symbols of resilience, inspiring a new generation of designers towards radically innovative design solutions, to be used in competitive sports activities as well as in everyday life. To act as a "motivational speaker", regarding the above mentioned topics will be Andrea Beni, founder of the team Garpez - Disabili in Quad, the first racing team of drivers with motor disabilities; Andrea Lanfri, former Paralympic athlete of the national athletics team, silver medalist at the 2017 Paralympic World Championships and the 2018 Paralympic European Championships; Gregory Leperdi, former Olympic Hockey Player on Sledding and Mattia Cattapan, First disabled athlete in Italy to compete against normodotati athletes in the category Kart Cross.

The founding activities of this edition of BRAVERY BAR include workshops, exhibitions, performances and podcasts. Every day 25 young designers, guided by a selected group of teachers and experts linked to the BRAVERY BAR’s creative schools, interact with leading companies in order to develop innovative design proposals, exploring the fields of Product Design, Digital Communication and Textile Design.

"Design is a broad tool that can bring solutions and projects in many fields - explains the Country Manager of the AD Education group Alessandro Colombo - and with BE AWARE you want to investigate the relationship with its own limits putting the public in comparison with athletes who thanks to technology, innovation, physical strength and will can achieve performance of the highest level. The concept of limit is broad and part of each one of us, and precisely because of its nature we must learn to cross it".

In the context of "BE AWARE" is also presented "OUT OF BOUNDS - Beyond the lines of play and the predetermined limits", an unprecedented exhibition of works by Truly Design dedicated to sport. The crew of Turin artists born in 2003 from a passion for graffiti, illustration and graphic design, translates concepts through geometric abstraction, deconstructing forms and spaces and contaminating them with colors. From tapestries to paintings, installations to printed works, and even uniforms, tables, a selection of works will be exhibited in which sport and inclusiveness are interpreted through forms of visual language always new and different.

In addition, high technology and high craftsmanship, two souls of the Made in Italy, are compared to create objects and tools that can increase the performance of the Paralympic athletes, while the best Italian companies of the sector exhibit an iconic project in the field of sports of this category. There is no shortage of live performances with the immersive experiences of "In My Shoes", designed to raise awareness about disability issues and in which users have the opportunity to experience a new condition. Finally, the podcasts of "Another View" offer a 10-minute guide to better understand the city and its limits. 

With this initiative, IAAD., Accademia Italiana and SAE Institute confirm their commitment to promote talent and innovation, creating a bridge between education and contemporaneity. Through a training approach that combines theory and practice, the schools of the AD Education circuit accompany the growth of a new generation of designers capable of facing and reinterpreting the challenges of the present as that of social inclusivity. Events such as the BRAVERY BAR foster synergies between academia, professional and business, offering the public a dynamic and inclusive view of design. A project that reaffirms the mission of forming minds ready to transform the future.