Miguel Milá Industrial and interior designer, inventeur and bricoleur.
A documentary project by Poldo Pomés Leiz. Miguel Milá i Sagnier (Barcelona, 1931), winner of the National Design Award, the Compasso d’Oro and Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts is one of the unquestionable masters of industrial design in Spain. With this documentary, director Poldo Pomés Leiz seeks to showcase the figure and his work in a simple and natural manner. “I’ve sought to shed greater light on the master”, a process he describes in a highly natural manner as Milá has formed a major part of his life: “his works were part and parcel of my upbringing.” An insight into the character and working methods of Miguel Milá conveyed through conversations with the figures who have formed part of his life, including Federico Correa, André Ricard, Isabel López and Fernando Amat. Milá talks with them surrounded by his most symbolic masterpieces, such as the TMC, the M68 and the Cesta. The documentary provides us with a portrayal of Milá and the garage he uses as a workshop where he still manufactures all manner of objects and where we also see him building the model for a new bench alongside his son Gonzalo Milá, also a designer. As part of a journey shrouded in emotion, Pomés’ camera also accompanies the master to the Sala Vinçon, just a few days after its closure, to pay tribute to the emblematic Barcelona store, to Servei Estació and to the Círcol Maldà in order to remember Milá’s signing past. “Designing means arranging all the elements that comprise a whole”; “My father used to say: ‘Be useful and you will be used.’ I will try to be useful.”; “I work to endear people to me.” These are just some of the statements the master bequeaths us throughout the film. Miguel Milá, industrial and interior designer, inventor and bricoleur is a documentary stemming from two years of efforts produced by Santa & Cole, the editing company with which Milá began working thirty years ago. “Miguel has deserved a documentary for some time now. His work marks a turning point in the history of Spanish design” says Nina Masó, co-founder and editor at Santa & Cole.