MINI x Paul Smith garden

MINI is turning a historic Milan palazzo into a public garden for six days, and the point is not to sell tickets to a runway crowd. The installation opens April 21, 2026, at Palazzo Borromeo d’Adda on Via Alessandro Manzoni 41 during Milan Design Week, with daily hours from 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. (press.bmwgroup.com) The setup is called “A Garden of Curiosity,” and MINI says it was built with Paul Smith around shared British roots, color, and a playful design language. BMW Group’s release says the installation also presents the new MINI Paul Smith Edition, so the garden is both an event space and a product showcase. (press.bmwgroup.com) That timing is not random. Salone del Mobile.Milano, the main fair anchoring Milan Design Week, runs from April 21 to April 26, 2026, and the official organizer calls it the 64th edition of the event at Rho Fiera Milano. (salonemilano.it) In Milan, the fairgrounds are only half the story. The City of Milan says Milan Design Week runs across the city from April 20 to April 26, 2026, which is why brands use palazzi, courtyards, and storefronts as temporary stages instead of staying inside exhibition halls. (comune.milano.it) MINI and Paul Smith have history here, and this garden lands after years of smaller design crossovers between them. In 2021, they unveiled the MINI STRIP, a one-off electric MINI Cooper SE that Paul Smith and MINI described as an exercise in “simplicity, transparency and sustainability,” built by stripping the car back to its structural basics. (paulsmith.com, press.bmwgroup.com) This year’s collaboration is less like a concept car on a pedestal and more like a branded room you can walk through. BMW Group says the installation is immersive, and design publication Dezeen says it uses color and sound to build a playful environment rather than a conventional static display. (press.bmwgroup.com, dezeen.com) The address matters because Via Alessandro Manzoni sits in central Milan, a short walk from the luxury shopping district around Via Monte Napoleone. That makes the installation easy to stumble into for design-week foot traffic in a way a trade-fair booth in Rho usually is not. (google.com, salonemilano.it) MINI has been testing this city-facing format before. In October 2023, BMW Group Italy opened a “House of MINI” in Milan for the launch of new models, describing it as an immersive brand space open to visitors in the city center rather than a dealer showroom. (press.bmwgroup.com) Paul Smith is also not just lending a logo. MINI USA says the new MINI Paul Smith Edition will be sold in limited numbers across the MINI Cooper S 2 Door, Cooper S 4 Door, and Cooper S Convertible, which turns the Milan installation into the stage set for a real commercial release, not a one-night art stunt. (miniusa.com) So the story here is a car brand using design week like a fashion house uses a flagship store. For six days in late April 2026, MINI gets a public-facing Milan address, Paul Smith gets a live environment instead of a lookbook page, and visitors get a free walk-in installation tied to an actual limited-edition car launch. (press.bmwgroup.com, miniusa.com, comune.milano.it)