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Miguel Mila. Barcelona, ​​1931. Its lamps and cane chairs are a classic and has designed the banks and the Barcelona metro. His uncle commissioned La Pedrera from Gaudí. Now he publishes his memoirs: The essential. Design and other things in life (Lumen).

Looking at your minimalist designs one might think that you are a defender of rationality, but in the book you talk a lot about beauty and emotion. If a design is not useful, it ends up being ugly. Aesthetics is very important. It is so difficult to achieve that it is not paid much attention and even despised a little. Beauty has no laws, it is not rational. It depends on the education one has received. For me the most important thing is to achieve a well-being that helps the comfort of life. Luxury is not always comfort, but comfort is always luxury. We spend a lot of time with the objects that surround us. Of the hours we spend next to a lamp are more than it is off than on. Although not in use, objects keep us company. That is why they have to be more than useful. It is described as someone saving and practical, but flirtatious. It is that dressing well is a matter of respect for oneself and others. This trend of going with torn pants now seems silly to me. Fashion is what goes out of style, he says in the book, but his creations are fashionable. I argue that no, that they have never been fashionable because if they had been, they would no longer be. I never imagined the success they could have. What is your secret? When I was very young, I grabbed, in a somewhat budgetary way, a phrase from the bullfighter Guerra, who was asked: teacher, what is classic? He replied: what cannot be done better. Until then for me the classic was the Parthenon, the Alhambra in Granada. I grabbed that phrase and tried to do my best. Have you seen the copies of your lamps in the Chinese bazaars? No, but I know. The Chinese do what they want. Deep down I am encouraged to be copied, something I will have done well. Now it is fashionable to be an environmentalist, but you already were 50 years ago, what do you think? You have to try, it's a matter of survival. I find it illogical and absurd to have more solar energy in Germany than here. I've always worried about being conservative of things. That is why I declare myself more evolutionary than revolutionary. When I am asked what political idea I have, I always answer: progressive conservative. I like to keep what's right and improve what's not right. The revolution, to destroy, is a shame. His father was president of the Diputación de Barcelona. His uncle Perico raised the Monumental and commissioned La Pedrera from Gaudí. His great uncle founded the Massana. The great-grandfather of his wife built the Cathedral of Barcelona. Being a Mila weighs? No, I have always liked to meet with mine. For me, family gatherings are essential. My father was angry if we weren't going to eat at home. I am absolutely in favor of the family. And how is that to walk along Gràcia's promenade, where La Pedrera, Casa Milá is, and see there the benches that you designed next to the lanterns of your son Gonzalo, and get off the subway, What is white because you designed it? It is an extremely pleasant feeling. To be able to participate in what helps order and well-being I like. I like everything that serves and take advantage of things so that objects do not die. When I see something that is not right I restore it, I put oil on it, whatever. I am very bothered by the leaking faucets. What is the last thing that has been fixed? Today I have been making the handle of a cane with the trunks of a boxwood from the garden that has died. In the 80s and 90s, when Mariscal became fashionable, he got doubts, didn't he? At that time my style didn't fit, I came to think I was wrong. I had a moment of crisis, which is always good. Everything teaches. I rebelled against that idea and decided to go on my way, to do things as I liked them. Have you never been told that you have some Japanese? Look, we went to Japan to a congress and I was shocked: everything seemed mechanical, a Little fake, artificial, too tidy everything. But over time I respect him much more. I got the feeling that everything was theatrical. The tea ceremony they did for us was beautiful, but in the end you thought: have tea and shut up. In these things Pla was right when he said that you have to travel more. In the book he confesses that he was stuttering and that he had a music group, the Trio Son. Yes, with Antonio Rentería and Alfonso Vilallonga, we had a great time. Alfonso inherited the Maldá Galleries and took advantage of a corner to make a theater. We sang three times a week and many people came to see us, we really enjoyed ourselves, I was never ashamed. The theater and the song went very well to correct the stuttering. My father tried to take me to a speech therapist that was not effective at all. Doing theater I realized that you become the character you are playing and that as I was not, I lost stuttering. But then I thought: but it is me! I can do theater in life! When I got married at 33 I was still stuttering. The M cost me a lot and calling me Miguel Milá ... I had to fix it. The book is very gentle, except with the modern chefs, whom he criticizes. It is that the kitchen has gotten out of hand, it has become in graphic design, in a beautiful little drawing that costs to destroy. I prefer a good dish of beans or peas, which you don't feel sorry for eating them. His mother was very saving and his father more wonderful, who did he go out to? My father was presumed, I have inherited that from him. As a child I liked to look at him while he tied his tie. My mother was always turning off the lights. The family educates, although then we all develop our personality. You are the living portrait of the Catalan bourgeois, discreet and austere. Everything has its good and bad part. The Catalan bourgeoisie made possible things that are very good, such as Ensanche. Then it broke down because the Catalans also have bad things, and that is that we are caught and we do not like to squander and those apples so open ... you could not leave a span of land in the air and parking began to be built. And La Pedrera? He did not always have a good reputation. Because it was very new and creative, sometimes even too much. Gaudí was a genius with a cheesy point at the end. I would like to have written a book whose title was Pedrera also comes from Pedro , because the one who orders a house, which in this case was my uncle Pedro, also influences. I think he had to do with it being Gaudí's best work along with the Güell Crypt. How did they stay at home when their niece Mercedes told them she was going to introduce Big Brother? The truth is that we didn't like anything. She has a lot of merit and she does great, although I did not like the program. I love Mercedes very much, she is a great professional. Although sometimes it makes us suffer.

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