DJ ARCH 2022 in Milan: an event for Milan’s architectural practices

↓ HERE BELOW IS THE VIDEO OF THE EVENT ↓

Friends of DJ4, here we are once again this year behind the decks for the 2022 edition of DJ Arch, an event organised by the agency towant.eu (thanks, Gianluca!), which spotlights Milan’s leading architecture firms (and beyond), who present their playlists – mixed in collaboration with us DJs – in the city’s most iconic design showrooms. In our case, we were guests of Zanotta, in Piazza 25 Aprile, just a stone’s throw from Corso Como (There were other events taking place in the city, for example, at Foro Buonaparte and Piazza Fontana).

Set-up of the venue (opposite Eataly) began in the afternoon: bearing in mind that our sound and lighting system had to be installed in a design icon such as the showroom Zanotta, we tried to integrate our equipment as effectively as possible, starting with the positioning of the flight case on the exquisite designer glass table. The speakers were set up outside, as the designated indoor space was not large enough to accommodate the audience, which turned out to be very large: usually, DJ Arch is an invitation-only event attended solely by guests, but as this particular event was held outdoors in a busy area, the audience was considerably larger than usual.

We even set up some uplighting using our LED spotlights to illuminate the columns in the Zanotta showroom: here’s the result!

The evening gets underway right on time aperitif: how can you resist playing some ’cool“ music in the heart of the city that invented the happy hour?
A few picks deep & soulful, a sophisticated and lively atmosphere that sets the tone for the Milanese as they wind down after work. All this takes place before the official start of the event, scheduled for after 8 pm.

Then we start to get the crowd going, picking out a few of the current hits and encouraging them to join in… here we go, we’re kicking off with the DJ sets by architectural practices:

Chiocca Design
Gianluca, Enrico, Alessandra

Giuseppe Leida & Associates
Giuseppe and Antonietta

LPA Longo Palmarini Architecture & Partners
Alessandro and Alessandro

Sammarro Architecture Studio
Pierluigi and Niccolò

Tectoo
Matteo and Chiara

You can listen to some tracks from the DJ set in the official video; they were all absolutely fascinating and varied! From experimental music to rock and dance, each studio put together a selection that was entirely personal and distinctive, which we mixed “in collaboration” with the architects themselves, deciding with them on the connections between the tracks (We suggested the best combinations of tracks, which were to be as similar as possible in terms of tempo (BPM) and sound.).

Between one DJ set and the next, we played a selection of our own choice to get everyone involved (Piazza XXV Aprile had almost turned into a nightclub) until we reached the grand finale with Freed from desire by Gala, which got the crowd singing along… we’ll let you enjoy that for yourselves by watching the video. See you next year at DJ Arch 2023!