Molteni Group CEO Sees Nautical Expansion, Growth Opportunities

MILAN — Molteni&C has just furnished private residences on two vessels for Explora Journeys, the luxury lifestyle brand of shipping and cruise ship company MSC Group. Expected to be unveiled by the end of the year are the Ocean Penthouses, Ocean Residences and Owner’s Residence on board of Explora I, the first of up to six luxury ships.

Not every furniture company is poised to outfit ships, but Molteni&C has customized models like the Walter and Margou armchairs by Flemish architect and creative director Vincent Van Duysen, and the Chelsea and Devon seatings, the D.552.2 and Palinfrasca chairs, designed by the late Italian designers Rodolfo Dordoni, Gio Ponti and Luca Meda, respectively, for ocean travel.

In an interview with WWD, Molteni Group chief executive officer Marco Piscitelli said hospitality and the nautical sector represent lucrative areas of growth for the Giussano-based company, which was founded by Angelo and Giuseppina Molteni in 1934. The firm is now being run by Piscitelli, together with the founders’ descendants.

“The world of luxury this year has seen a slowdown and the only sectors that have performed positively have been precisely those of hospitality and cruises in addition to cosmetics,” Piscitelli said.

Despite the ongoing market correction, after the post-pandemic boom, Molteni Group’s sales are expected to have risen 10 percent to 520 million euros in 2024, making it one of Italy’s biggest luxury furniture makers by revenues.

Molteni Group has worked with Italian shipyard Fincantieri, one of the world’s largest, for 30 years. Through Fincantieri, it has worked on 6,000 passenger ships for Costa and Carnival cruises. It has also developed luxury charter vacations like the The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection and The Four Seasons Yacht, which like Explora Journeys are in sync with its own luxury DNA.

The nautical sector is on the rise, despite the economic slowdown. Its sales have been buoyed by bespoke yachts. Sales of the Italian yacht sector, the biggest in the world, rose 13.6 percent to 8.33 billion euros in 2023, according to the Yachting in Figures report produced by the Italian Marine Industry Association’s Market Intelligence and Research Department that was released at the end of September.

Shipbuilder Azimut|Benetti Group, which was ranked as the number-one firm in the world according to length built by Boat International, noted a boom in orders. In October, the Avigliana, Italy-based company said it has a solid backlog for boats that have yet to be built, up to 2029 for some Benetti models, with 40 percent of its clientele hailing from Europe, followed by the Americas at 37 percent and the Middle East and North Africa at a total of 23 percent.

Similarly, Ameglia, Italy-based Sanlorenzo, the second-ranked builder by length, under art director Piero Lissoni since 2018, said it closed the first half of 2024 with revenues up 6.9 percent. In its most recent financial report released Sept. 9, the firm said it sees sustainable growth over time. Its main geographic drivers were similar, with the Middle East and North Africa region sales up 142 percent, the Americas up 9.2 percent and Asia Pacific up 20.9 percent.

In 2024, Molteni Group bucked the trend, expecting to report a rise in revenue of 520 million euros in revenue up from 470 million euro in revenue in 2023, as it opened new stores worldwide. Molteni Group planned 18 openings total for 2025, including São Paulo; Mumbai; Mexico City; Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Sydney; Auckland, New Zealand; Chengdu, China; and Bangkok. It opened two stores in Russia — one in Moscow and one in St. Petersburg — through a retail partner in 2024.

Molteni Group, which owns luxury furniture and design firm Molteni&C as well as partitions and office furniture firm Citterio and workspace solutions firm UniFor, said it booked about 50 percent of its sales through its retail channel and 50 percent through contract, the latter being a main driver for luxury furniture peers in 2024 and into 2025. “We have this multichannel business now that has been tested for many years of innate ability to operate in a synergic way on many markets, on many different channels,” Piscitelli said.