For the premier edition of Salone Raritas, to be held at the Salone fairground for 2026 Milan Design Week, (April 21-26) Job Smeets presents SOFT PARADE, an original collection conceived forthe new international player Mouromtsev Design Editions and curated by Maria Cristina Didero. Softness created in collaboration with Gufram.

Presented for the first time during 2026 Milan Design Week, the project frames a reflection on the thematic of “softness” (standing for kindness, openness) not as consolation, but as a critical position articulated in response to current and general contemporary conditions of uncertainty. The response is an ironical game of play with concepts and forms which plays with double layers of meanings, that try to depict a human major feelings and contradictions.

For Job Smeets softness is not opposed to hardness, but it operates alongside it. It is not a retreat from reality, but a way of negotiating it. In this collection, irony sits at the core, allowing contradiction to remain visible and tension to be held. Rather than offering comfort, the pieces of works articulate a measured optimism grounded in conviction: a belief in humour and tenderness as deliberate positions to experience the world.

The collection comprises six singular pieces, from different typologies of objects (daybed, carpet, floor lamp, table, coffee table, and lounge chair), each structured around a reversal of expectationand play of forms. Objects associated with fragility, danger, discipline or seriousness are reconfigured through material and symbolic displacement. For examples, a feather daybed, fragile and by nature incapable of bearing weight, becomes a support for the body. A tire, symbolizing infinity and moulded from a ready-made is a crucial object for humanity and emblem of speed and industry – emits light and bears the statement ‘The World Will Be Saved By Beauty’. Pink bubble gum emerges from candy dispensers that overflow upwards to form a dining table, allowing childhood joy to accompany a functional object. Fire, historically a threat,an untamed element becomes here a place of rest. Strength is expressed through softness rather than force; danger is neutralised through care. Everything is dressed in a healthy dose of irony as our life would be pretty much unbearable without it!