In a perfect extension for a brand loved by designers, artists, and creatives, Moleskine has opened its first-ever centrally-located Moleskine Café, a two-story social and cultural hub offering food, coffee, retail, and space for exhibits by fans and artists, workshops, and more in the heart of Milan.
The Moleskine Café is a brand new format that reinterprets the idea of the café littéraire in a very contemporary mood. Mixing elements of the café, art gallery, store and library, it supplies energy to boost creativity as well as space for deep thinking and relaxation.
The Moleskine Café debuts at Corso Garibaldi 65 in the Brera Design District of Moleskine Company’s hometown, Milan, ready to be replicated in global cities worldwide. The new café in Milan, developed with international brand consultancy Interbrand, is the first to be centrally located and follows the success of the pilot Moleskine Café in Geneva Airport.
The sofa area in the mezzanine is for reading, working and quiet conversations; the bar at the ground floor is where energizing coffee is served together with art shows, talks, workshops, books and notebooks. Outside a terrace opens up to the spectacle of city streets.
The new café format is designed à la Moleskine: essential, clean aesthetics and a contemporary color palette of neutral colors, just like the ivory color of a Moleskine notebook, for a tranquil mood that enables privacy as well as conversation. Floor-to-ceiling windows give the sense of limitless space between the interior, the terrace and the city street outside.
The two-level layout reflects the dual purpose of the café. On the ground floor: a bar, communal table, and areas for shopping, exhibits, talks, and workshops spur conversation and interaction among friends and guests. In the sofa area in the mezzanine: a more intimate setting to unplug, read, and create.
Just like the iconic Moleskine notebook, which was inspired by the notebooks used by the avant-garde artists of the last century, the Moleskine Café revisits an idea from the past. There is a strong connection to the Enlightenment-era literary cafés, unofficial public spaces where conversations were held about the important ideas of the time that became hubs of cultural, artistic and political life in Europe’s great cities.
all images © Michele Morosi