Reflecting Diverseness at 5Vie - Via Cesare Correnti 14
… a data-driven spatial installation.
During Milan Design Week 2026, studio mo man tai presents a new iteration of Reflecting Diverseness as a site-specific spatial installation in the historic villa at Via Cesare Correnti 14, curated within the 5Vie design district. Following its widely noted debut at Dutch Design Week 2025, the project is transposed into a Milanese edition — translating the city’s unique demographic composition into a sparkling immersive presentation.
Milan is one of Italy’s most multicultural cities. As of early 2026, with a population of approximately 1.4 million residents, it stands as the country’s most cosmopolitan urban center. This layered social fabric forms the foundation of the installation.
Created by Ulrike Jurklies and Paul Bas, Reflecting Diverseness visualizes statistical data of the social fabric to reveal how diversity generates richness, balance, and cultural depth within a city. Each mirrored flower represents a specific portion of Milan’s population, collectively forming a reflective landscape that transforms statistical information into an emotional and spatial experience.
The flowers are crafted from leftover acrylic mirror materials collected by Pyrasied — industrial surplus reworked into a luminous instalation. What was deemed for recycling becomes a sparkling, immersive flower bed that captures light, movement, and the reflections of visitors themselves. The audience is not merely observing the work; they become part of it.
By translating demographic data into a visually compelling installation, studio mo man tai continues its exploration of how material transformation can amplify positive social narratives.
First presented in the Netherlands as a ‘portrait’ of Dutch society, the installation now evolved to reflect Milan’s unique demographic composition. In doing so, it underscores a universal idea: diversity is not an abstract concept, but a living structure shaped by individuals.
Data translated...
“Data often feels abstract and distant,” say Ulrike Jurklies and Paul Bas of studio mo man tai; “…by turning numbers into something fragile, reflective and physical, we make diversity truly ‘visible’ — and we offer people to see themselves within…”
The installation consists of 64 boxes – each box containing acrylic flowers precisely representing the demographic composition of the city. A total of 3150 flowers were handmade and for this particular execution the statistic was not merely translated into the number of flowers but the cumulative (visible) surface of the flowers representing a certain nationality is in proportion with the statistical value. The colours and shapes are chosen randomly without any reference to a country or national trait or flag.
The choice was made to ‘only’ select the 10 most represented foreign nations and to cluster the others into one category – RoW (Rest of the World).
The statistical data on which the installation is based is an aggregated collection of different, public available sets like this one.
At the end of Milan Design Week the boxes will be available for sale for those visitors willing to take a representative part of the installation with them…
As part of 5Vie, Reflecting Diverseness carves out a space for reflection within the density of the design program. The installation invites visitors to move along a mirrored meadow that is both celebratory and contemplative; where statistics shimmer, identities overlap, and collective presence becomes visible.
HR visuals and text for download
An archive with images made/collected from the start of the project and during the presentation in Milan is here. Feel free to download the material but please let us know when you publish them.
Download album: Images
Pdf press release: Reflecting Diverseness.
Pdf press release: Reflecting Diverseness – short
Pdf press release: About studio mo man tai
Pdf press release: About studio mo man tai – short
Partners
Sustainable entrepreneurship is the only right way to do business for Pyrasied. In their view, there is only one path to a sustainable future, and that is circular production. Even after 40 years, acrylic is still in excellent condition; it is sustainable because it lasts a long time and retains its qualitative appearance. The fact that it is also fully recyclable and can serve as the basis for new projects makes it even more sustainable. Pyrasied supplies all the leftover materials that mo man tai processes.
About studio mo man tai
…a design studio based in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, founded in 2005 by Ulrike Jurklies. The studio and label is known for its colorful design products and innovative approach to design, focusing on sustainability and social relevance – studio mo man tai strongly believes in cooperation, in a limitless mindset, in designing boundless and realizing something tangible.
They are here to shape what you want to express, what you want to show and/or what you want to experience. They are known to share their knowledge and they like to explore. In their view nothing is impossible through in-house expertise and a broad external network.
They are here to shape what you want to express, what you want to show and/or what you want to experience. They are known to share their knowledge and they like to explore. In their view nothing is impossible through in-house expertise and a broad external network.
You can contact them for concept development, graphic design, product-, furniture- and interior design, for devising new strategies within organizations, for visual story telling and for immersive installations. A generalists’ offer through a full service experience.
Ulrike Jurklies 
+316 3149 0204
Paul Bas +316 1382 4382
Visiting address: Hastelweg 264A, 5652CN Eindhoven
Information about our Re-campaign installation at Cavalerizze, Via Olona 2, is here.
HR visuals for download
An archive with images made/collected from the start of the project and during the presentation in Milan is here. Feel free to download the material but please let us know when you publish them.
Copyright: studio mo man tai – Eindhoven Netherlands 2026