Laurent Barnavon emerges as one of the most visionary voices in rethinking the relationship between matter, gesture and space. A French artist from conceptual training With his deeply interdisciplinary approach, Barnavon has transformed the fold — the primordial act of folding and unfolding — into a contemporary language capable of dialoguing with architecture, light, the body and the imagery of fashion. His works, from paper models to spatial structures to experiments with steel, are not mere objects: they are devices that invite us to look at space as something to be composed, decomposed and reinvented.
For Dressing the Future 2025, Barnavon brings to Milan a body of work spanning twenty years of exploration, collaborations with major fashion houses, studies in geometry and immersion in the historical techniques of pleating. His installation site specific and the workshop Out of Frame: Pliage between art and fashion open a window onto an imaginary world where craftsmanship, futurism and responsibility coexist, transforming the fold into an act that is both poetic and structural.
A rare guest, capable of uniting artistic intuition and design precision, and to show how sustainability can be not just a theme, but a gesture: a way of touching matter to reveal new possibilities. In this interview, Barnavon guides us into his universe — made up of light, patience, geometry and shared visions — revealing how the future is constructed, fold after fold.
What was the moment or experience that convinced you to combine the technique of folding (origami) with architecture and design, and why these materials in particular?
After graduating in conceptual art from Villa Arson in Nice, I joined the Pistoletto Foundation as an artist, where I worked for several years as a volunteer alongside the master Michelangelo Pistoletto. It was thanks to this experience – combining artistic practice and consultancy – and then my move to Paris, that I decided to work with the major historic companies in the sector. In this context, I was able to combine my passion for geometry with the desire to create a link between my design vision and the preservation of traditional techniques, which I consider fundamental to protect and enhance.
In your projects, such as Plissé and Reflection, the scale varies significantly: from lamps to environmental installations. How do you deal with the change of scale in the creative process?
For me, the real charm lies in the dual gesture: explaining and folding. The first action requires great patience, the second even more manual dexterity, and they are also opposite in the speed with which they lead to a result. For me, this represents a much more significant change of scale than the simple difference in size. Thanks to the power and beauty of geometry, if a principle works on a small scale, it will also work on a large scale — just like in Gaudí's extraordinary inverted models for the Sagrada Familia.
To what extent do you consider functionality (use, durability, maintenance) in your work, as opposed to purely aesthetic or conceptual aspects?
Functionality is of primary importance, because it is through the contemplative gaze or the hands of the user that the work truly finds its meaning. I do not create for myself: for me, there is the research phase, which is the most intimate and personal moment. But the aesthetic result — which for me remains inseparable from the concept — only reaches its best form when it is delivered to the other and adopted. What I am looking for, ultimately, is precisely this: to offer an experience of use, a gesture that transforms the object into something alive and shared.
What are the most delicate challenges – technical or design-related – when working with “delicate” materials (such as paper) in more structural architectural contexts?
Paper is a design medium, just like a pencil: it becomes the means through which geometry manifests itself, and geometry itself becomes a structuring mechanism. But the real challenge, which for me is also the most fascinating, concerns architecture as a common language, capable of connecting hundreds of different trades in a single work cycle and towards a single result. On an individual and collective level, it is through repetition that we learn. The challenge, however, is that when working alone, it is easier to make mistakes, whereas in many trades this margin for error simply does not exist.
Looking ahead, is there a new material, technique or spatial context that you would like to explore and have not yet had the opportunity to put into practice?
My art has always been something I have put aside in order to devote the necessary time to learning from others and sharing the collective commitment to being responsible. I have tried to be as light-hearted as possible, experimenting with forms of mobility that would make boundaries and time disappear. Today, I feel the need to stop and finally have my own workshop: perhaps this is what I should be looking for now – but who knows. So far, collective, interdisciplinary and intercultural creation has been my greatest satisfaction.
What will we see at Dressing the Future? Both in terms of installations and workshops? In the site-specific installation Ce n'est qu'une impression, Milano 25, I will present the result of twenty years of research: a female Vitruvian Man, where a painting is transformed into a dress, revealing the model's shape. This concept has prompted me to learn many things and to explore uncharted territory in the world of fashion. Why dress a person in a painting or create a dress from a single piece? In terms of fashion, the answer is not immediately obvious, but in terms of art, it is clear to me. Like a sculptor, I immersed myself in the historical pleating techniques used in my career in Parisian haute couture, to feel the material with my hands and reveal the secrets that sublimate fabrics, making light bounce off them like the facets of a diamond. For Dressing the Future, two paintings will be presented, two versions of Vitruvian Woman, with the participation of Mimoza Koike, solo dancer with the Ballets de Monte-Carlo. In addition, a dress on a mannequin, a fundamental work in my career, composed of pages from fashion magazines, in collaboration with L'Officiel Vietnam. At a workshop level, through the history of pleating — from ancient Egyptian, Chinese and Hmong fashion to contemporary haute couture — we will explore together manual sensitivity and concrete experimentation, transforming the material to reflect on what to wear and, above all, on the responsibility that comes with the act of dressing.
What skills do you think young designers should develop — or what “toolbox” should they build — to approach your area of expertise, as a representative of one of the possible sectors and fields of application of their future professions?
The first word that comes to mind is passion. In all creative professions, the quest to do something differently from others requires inner strength: without the passion to overcome difficulties and misunderstandings, true creation, capable of breaking free from the limits of the “normative” sector, cannot emerge. Technical skills alone are not enough. This is why I believe it is essential to learn from the experience of others, especially those who are no longer with us, such as traditional knowledge or classical techniques. Only in this way can we understand whether a change represents real progress, for whom and for what purpose. In addition to passion, a designer's real “toolbox” must include patience, similar to that of a concert performer or an Olympic champion. Constant repetition is the first teacher, but also the greatest challenge in life, not only on a professional level.
