How the School of Design in Milan reverses the brain drain

The School of Design at the Politecnico di Milano is today the largest international university, in terms of both number of students and number of lecturers, for the training of product, communication, interior and fashion designers.

There are currently 4 Degree courses (3 years): Industrial Product Design, Communication Design, Fashion Design, Interior Design.

There are also 7 Master's Degree Courses active at the Milan Bovisa site and 1 inter-university course active at the University of Genoa. At Milano Bovisa you can therefore study Integrated Product Design, Communication Design, Design for the Fashion System, Interior and Spatial Design, Design&Engineering (Industrial Product Design and Engineering), Product Service Systems Design. Digital and interaction design

The number of students enrolled is 4300, with a steady flow of around a thousand young people entering the three-year degree programme and another 700 entering the master's programme, where courses are mainly taught in English. Of these, between 30 and 35% come from abroad.

Il campus di Via Durando alla periferia nord ovest di Milano

Milano, Politecnico, sede di Milano Bovisa, . veduta del cortile interno del campus. Foto di Corrado Crisciani.

"The ranking also takes this into account and we are happy to be in this position. Taking into account that we cannot fight on equal terms: while we are a public facility, all the others ahead of us are private. MIT recently obtained a $100 million private donation to completely reorganise its premises, something that will never happen to us. Whereas if we take the fees we pay, our 2-3 thousand euros a year compares with the 70 thousand dollars paid to get into the Parsons School in New York, a difference that evidently allows for quite different investments'.

Students leaving the Politecnico's School of Design have no difficulty in finding their place in the market, taking into account an employment rate that averages 95% one year after graduation, rising to 100% in Design Engineering.

"Here, young people are already receiving offers long before they finish their theses," Zurlo explains, "not least because the number of companies hiring is expanding. Not only stylists or brands of furniture and furnishings, but recently also consulting companies that are setting up design departments for everything that has to do with the digital world. Many young people who come here from abroad to study find work in Italian companies: looking at the balance between flight and attraction in terms of 'brains', this School is able to play a positive role'.

A new three-year degree (the fifth) dedicated to the design of hi-tech platforms (Interaction Design) is now being launched to learn how to 'design' the objects that shape our lives. "If we take a smartphone or a smartwatch," Zurlo explains, "the upstream interface does not immediately come to mind, which is instead a key element for its functionality. You need an understanding of ergonomics, of the mental schemes with which you approach a product. A lot of electronics will be studied, but not only. We are starting with 50 students in an English-language course, starting this course in our branch office in Lecco".

It is the themes of the Salone del Mobile that have prompted the organisers of the trade fair to entrust the Politecnico di Milano with the study of the impact of this exhibition on the territory, building an ad hoc Observatory.

It starts with a research project "Salone-as-ecosystem", which intends to investigate the phenomenon of the Milan Design Week in the field in a scientific key. An initiative promoted by Federlegno Arredo Eventi - Salone del Mobile.Milano, and realised by the Department of Design, in collaboration with the School of Design and the Municipality of Milan. Research that aims to deepen the phenomenon in its socio-economic scope on the territory (in terms of impact but also of legacy), through the collection and analysis of new indicators, as well as through collective and plural reflections of the stakeholders active on the scene. This first operation, carried out in 2024, will lay the foundations for a future Salone del Mobile Observatory, a permanent research platform dedicated to identifying opportunities and challenges affecting Salone del Mobile.Milano and the city. The Observatory will inform future decisions regarding Design Week, to make it more sustainable, inclusive and in dialogue with Milan and its current policies. The survey will make use of a mixed research methodology, based on the analysis of heterogeneous databases provided by private and public actors, a process of involvement of Design Week stakeholders and a monitoring and observation activity conducted by the Scuola del Design. The results will be collected in a final report with a dissemination format, to be published by the end of the year.

"We are starting with a field study entrusted to 150 students,' Zurlo explains, 'to assess what really happens during this week, inside and outside the exhibition. The ultimate goal is then to systematise all existing databases on the subject, so that we can arrive at shared indicators'.