10 Exceptional Design Highlights from Miami Art Week

Miami Art Week is a weeklong whirlwind of buzzy fairs, brand activations, and raging parties that often leaves the industry’s head spinning long after the last Uber is called. There’s always a trove of exemplary art and design to be seen across the Magic City in just a few short days, and sometimes it seems impossible to fully take in the mind-bending work with such a stacked itinerary. For those who may struggle with pausing and processing it all, Galerie selected nine standout design moments from across town that are still resonating.

1. SolidNature and Sabine Marcelis for We Are Ona | Andaz Miami Beach 

From showstopping tables fashioned from salvaged offcuts to Alex Proba’s whimsical sculptures that delightfully clash with the Giza Pyramids in every possible way, SolidNature always seems to be cooking up something special. At Miami Art Week, the purveyor of natural stone teamed up with Rotterdam-based designer Sabine Marcelis on a candy-colored outdoor dining room (equipped with Bocci luminaires, no less) that cast dreamy chromatic shadows on the Andaz rooftop. It turned out to be one of the week’s hottest tickets. We Are Ona and its founder, Luca Pronzato, hosted culinary pop-ups there all week to treat guests to an indulgent menu devised by José Andrés Group inspired by Aguasal’s Mediterranean-meets-Miami philosophy, complete with unbeatable ocean views and beverages provided by House of Suntory whiskey. 

2. Moniomi Design x Chubb VIP Collector’s Lounge | Art Basel 

Art Basel attendees seeking a change of scenery from the bustling convention center floor (and its overhead lighting) found reprieve upstairs at the VIP Collectors Lounge, which Chubb entrusted local interiors studio Moniomi with to transform into a tropical fantasia with fabulously fun furniture and artworks. True to form, the husband-and-wife designers Ronald Alvarez and Monica Santayana drenched the retreat with an intoxicatingly moody mix of chartreuse and warm yellows evocative of Miami sunsets, set into motion by Avram Rusu Studio chandeliers, psychedelic Moniomi x Kyle Bunting wall coverings, ceramic cocktail tables by Sean Gerstley, a velvety Kravet sectional, and Moniomi’s own custom game tables that turned heads at this year’s Kips Bay Decorator Show House Palm Beach. It also served as a showpiece for the promising talents from Chubb’s New York Academy of Art Fellows, including Manuela Caicedo and Andrea Olivia. 

3. Oasis by Casa AnKan | Alcova 

There was no shortage of eye-catching creations on offer at Alcova, the roving showcase founded by Joseph Grima and Valentina Ciuffi, which solidified its Miami Art Week presence with another standout edition held among the oasis-like Miami River Inn’s pastel-hued facades. A particularly memorable outing came from Casa AnKan, the boutique collectible design gallery founded by Angelo Garrido and Ana Curiel specializing in limited-edition furniture, lighting, and sculptural works. Within a desert-inspired room drenched in dusty pink, they presented an array of limited-edition works—take a throne-like travertine seat by Monolith Studio whose rounded edges echo the shapes of J.T. Pfeiffer’s wool rug tapestry in a 1970s-inspired red gradient—that drummed up anticipation for the gallery’s first brick-and-mortar slated to open in Miami in 2026. 

4. Casa Malaparte by Gagosian | Design Miami 

Perched on an isolated promontory on the Tyrrhenian Sea’s majestic cliffs, the provocative intellectual Curzio Malaparte’s residence on Capri is an austere masterpiece of 20th-century architecture, its trapezoidal staircase and panoramic terraces exuding a romantic allure that has inspired decades of artists, filmmakers and architects. His youngest descendent, Tommaso Rositani Suckert, has been committed to preserving the property’s legacy by reproducing its most recognizable furnishings through in-depth research and careful material study. They starred in Gagosian’s subtle yet standout salon-style Design Miami booth, which recreated the sparseness of Casa Malaparte’s interiors. It situated pieces like an Italian walnut bench perched on squat Carrara marble columns and a console table made of tuff, a porous stone made from the compression of volcanic ash, each developed with master craftsman Philippe Pérès. An unmissable highlight is the Malaparte sofa, an iconic piece revisited by Jean-Luc Godard, who dressed it in an electric blue slipcover for his 1963 film Le Mépris (Contempt) shot at the home. 

5. “Gargantua’s Thumb” by Katie Stout | Miami Design District 

No, you weren’t hallucinating the giant stone creatures crawling among the Miami Design District’s tree-lined pathways and tony boutiques. Rather, they’re stone benches crafted by the playfully subversive New York artist Katie Stout, who was commissioned by the Design Miami Curatorial Lab to create memorable site-specific public artworks for the neighborhood. Each piece began as a miniature clay animal figurine, hand-sculpted by Stout and intentionally marked by the irregularities and absurd distortions that arise when working at an intimate scale. She then digitally scanned, dramatically enlarged, and worked with ALTBLD to fabricate each form, bringing a menagerie of fantastically distorted beasts to life that double as sculptural furniture. The pieces, ranging from a dog-shaped bench and whale-shaped fainting sofa to a frog-inspired perch, will be on display in the Miami Design District through the new year. 

6. Nicole Cherubini at September Gallery | Untitled 

Nicole Cherubini seems to be having a major career moment, having been recently picked up by September Gallery and Friedman Benda. At Untitled, the former showcased a sculptural installation of the New York artist’s geometric, glazed clay benches rearranged as communal seating for fatigued fairgoers. One day, the display transformed into a theatrical stage for three performances choreographed by Julia K. Gleich, in which dancers donning vibrant costumes improvised movements cued by a live cellist—part of an ongoing collaboration between Cherubini and Gleich that explores how contemporary ballet can activate space. Meanwhile, the sculptor presented a new ceramic work at Friedman Benda’s colorful Design Miami booth ahead of “Hotel Roma,” her solo exhibition opening at the gallery’s New York location in January.  

7. Villa Paula by The Future Perfect | Little Haiti 

The Future Perfect’s network of storybook residences that double as galleries is expanding apace. The story takes a slightly darker turn in Miami, where the collectible design purveyor founded by David Alhadeff recently moved into a history-laden Little Haiti residence that once served as the Cuban consulate and is rumored to be haunted by its namesake, Paula Milford. But whatever spirits that still linger in the Neoclassical structure’s timeworn halls are in good company with the gallery’s always-stellar lineup of collectible design rarities, spanning Vikram Goyal, Chris Wolston, Faye Toogood, Volker Haug, and, curiously, a six-foot woodpecker sculpture fashioned by local designer Autumn Casey sticking its beak through a doorway. 

8. I See You—I Love You by Ruben Toledo at Ralph Pucci | Wynwood 

Ruben Toledo was the man of the hour at Ralph Pucci’s gallery in Wynwood, which presented a dynamic exhibition of new works at a party co-hosted by Galerie. Among them: a large-scale mural titled I See You—I Love You, inspired by his beloved late wife, the acclaimed fashion designer Isabel Toledo, that stretches across the full length of the building’s facade; six new watercolor paintings from his Natural Selections series; and Birds sculptures originally designed as miniatures for a project he completed in Japan in the 1980s. On opening night, Ruben himself sketched painterly portraits of visitors to help raise funds for an upcoming documentary about the Toledos. The gallery also featured a small recreation of Ralph Pucci’s celebrated New York sculpture studio. During the evening, Ralph Pucci’s master sculptor recreated a live studio environment near Toledo, where he sculpted a bust of local designer Tamara Feldman. 

9. Fonderia Fendi by Conie Vallese | Design Miami 

Fendi has a knack for identifying tomorrow’s collectible design stars and presenting them in pristinely appointed Design Miami booths, with recent turns by Lewis Kemmenoe, Peter Mabeo, and Sabine Marcelis. This year follows suit, as the Italian house enlisted fast-rising designer Conie Vallese to channel Italy’s deep lineage of master craftsmen and historic ateliers through a romantic salon filled with artisan-crafted pieces shaped by her signature floral motifs. Vallese and curator Dan Thawley partnered with five Italian workshops to realize the project, from Milanese bronze foundry Fonderia Battaglia and Venetian glass maker Barovier & Toso to CC-Tapis, Officine Saffi, and Fendi’s own leather studio. The results range from bronze benches detailed with the house’s hand-sewn Selleria stitching and flat planes of cuoio Romano leather to a limited-edition Peekaboo bag, all set within a booth washed in a sunny pastel yellow. 

10. “Es Devlin: Library of Us” | Faena Miami Beach 

Libraries have been top of mind for trailblazing British set designer Es Devlin, who mounted a giant circular bookcase in the Pinacoteco di Brera—Cortile d’Onore at this year’s Milan Design Week. She reprised the feat in Miami, transforming the vast swath of sandy shoreline outside the Faena into Library of Us, an illuminated arena of knowledge that brings nearly 2,500 pieces of reading material to the beach in partnership with Faena Art and Chase Sapphire Reserve. Encircled by a reflecting pool and a circular reading table, the 20-foot-tall triangular structure rotates slowly on its axis, completing a full revolution over the course of ten minutes. Beyond books, the work contains a single 34-foot LED line streaming text, a soundscape of 250 excerpts read in Devlin’s voice, and a two-ring reading table that, as the structure rotates, slowly