DHAHRAN: The King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture, known as Ithra, is off to Europe for Milan Design Week, on until April 26.
Ithra is showcasing key features of the newly-rebranded Ithra Design Week, formerly known as Tanween, its annual flagship design event, now in its ninth year.
As a part of its participation, Ithra is presenting the exhibition: “Beyond the Ordinary” at the Isola Design Festival.
This marks the fourth year that Ithra and Isola Design are collaborating.
The exhibition represents the first tangible realization of IDW as a regional platform for designers.
The show will highlight creativity and cultural narratives to international audiences, while simultaneously widening creative channels for global dialogue on the future of design.
Ithra Programs Manager Noura Al-Zamil expressed excitement at the occasion.
“Ithra’s participation in Milan Design Week, one of the most important global events in the field of design, reflects the center’s mission to empower creative talent, strengthen cultural exchange, and support the growth of the creative economy at both regional and international levels,” she said.
Al-Zamil emphasized that Ithra’s presence at the design and creativity forum serves as an important platform for attracting designers from across the Middle East.
“It also highlights Ithra Design Week 2026, that (was) announced last year as a platform dedicated to supporting and advancing the future of Arab design,” she added.
The “Beyond the Ordinary” exhibition features works by eight designers from across the Middle East and North Africa region, and includes seven interactive stations.
Through the use of artificial intelligence, the exhibition collects visitor interaction data and transforms it into a dynamic map illustrating how cognitive patterns are shaped by diverse cultural influences.
This data will be later used to commission a designer to produce an entirely new piece reflecting the exhibition’s insights and outcomes.
The exhibition consists of seven interactive stations. One of them, “The Collective Sofa,” is a white seating installation by Studio Oblique from the UAE that transforms through visitor interaction into a shared archive reflecting their contributions.
Also being showcased is “Moments of Absence,” a sculptural installation featuring miniature ceramic chairs by Fajr Al-Basri from Bahrain that invites visitors to select and sketch the chair they most identify with.
Another will be “Body Blocks,” an interactive game by Davina Atteya from Lebanon, inspired by Mesopotamian figurative forms, enabling users to assemble hybrid characters through modular components.
Additional stations include “Attar Al-Balad” from Saudi Arabia, a sensory installation composed of sculptural blocks formed from traditional Saudi herbs and spices that evokes memory through scent.
The “Reflections” show, a collection of mirrors from Egypt, the UAE and Morocco, explores perceptions of color, form and identity.
Another is “Majma,” an interactive musical instrument by digital artist Samit Rohila, that enables visitors to collaboratively compose spontaneous collective soundscapes.
And there is “Daughters of Berythus,” an installation embedding traces of craft traditions and everyday life that invites visitors to explore material memory through touch.
Following its debut in Milan, the exhibition will travel to Saudi Arabia, where it will serve as the anchor for an IDW event later this year at the Ithra headquarters in Dhahran.
