New owner, new audiences: Miami’s premiere design festival is going through big changes
Design Miami/, a Miami-based collectible design forum that holds its fair during Miami Art Week, has a new owner.
Basic.Space, a marketplace that sells new and vintage items, announced that it acquired Design Miami/, which showcases collectible museum-quality 20th and 21st-century furniture, lighting, and artistic items from galleries around the world. Besides its fair in Miami Beach, the brand also has outposts in Basel, Shanghai and Paris. The announcement was made during the inaugural Design Miami/Paris fair this week.
Basic.Space, which has offices in Los Angeles and New York, plans to introduce collaborations with designers, evolve the fairs’ format and find additional locations for fairs, the company said in a statement. The company bought Design Miami/ to help pursue Gen Z and Millennial consumers, who are increasingly investing in collectible design.
Craig Robins, the real estate developer behind Miami’s Design District, is a co-founder of Design Miami/ and an early seed investor in Basic.Space. He will join the Basic.Space board.
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“Combining Basic.Space’s digital reach, keen understanding of curated collaborations, and community of leading-edge creatives with Design Miami/’s global forum of galleries, designers and luxury brands will invigorate the brand and position it for expansion into new territories for live experiences,” Robins said in a statement.
Jennifer Roberts will remain on board as Design Miami/’s CEO to oversee all fairs. Jesse Lee, the Basic.Space CEO and founder, will serve as the Design Miami/ board chairman.
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“Our community has become passionate about products beyond fashion, spending more on collectible design and related categories, and valuing both historic and contemporary material,” Lee said in a statement. “This is an opportunity to both meet that demand and shape how this and future generations will consume.”
The Design Miami/ fair returns from December 6 to 10.
This story was produced with financial support from The Pérez Family Foundation, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners, as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The Miami Herald maintains full editorial control of this work.