News: Ambra Medda, the director and co-founder of Design Miami/Basel, has announced the launch of L'ArcoBaleno, a website offering unique and limited edition pieces for sale alongside reports from the design world.

Launching in May, L'ArcoBaleno – which means rainbow in Italian – will combine an online shop with original reports and movies about culture and design trends.

Founder Ambra Medda, who left Design Miami in 2010, said: "L'ArcoBaleno will reflect the entire spectrum of design – that includes collectible objects, but also fashion, food, music, architecture, art and technology.

"Our hope is that it will influence the global design conversation, and inspire and engage collectors, curators, and devotees of creative fields."

The website's CEO Oliver Weyergraf added: "We have developed the site with a 'mobile first' approach, building it to address the needs consumers have today, and what we anticipate their needs will be in the future as commerce becomes an increasingly mobile function."

L'ArcoBaleno will be guided by an advisory board that includes architect David Adjaye, Greek shipping heir Stavros Niarchos, gallery owner Suzanne Demisch, musician and design fan Pharrell Williams and British designer Tom Dixon, with whom Medda partnered in 2011 for the launch of the MOST exhibition space in Milan.

Earlier this year the founder and CEO of online furniture retailer One Nordic criticised the way design is sold to the public. "I just feel that this whole industry is terrible at seeing that many people are moving online and willing to buy furniture online," Joel Roos told Dezeen. "In the furniture field many, many companies retail exactly the same way as they did in the seventies."

Last autumn, in a reversal of the trend for physical shops moving their business online, the homeware webstore Made.com opened a showroom in a west London office tower.

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