Miu Miu Summer Reads 2025 rewrites the urban summer From Beijing to Milan, five cities saw kaleidoscope kiosks pop up for the second edition of the project that combines literature, fashion and feminism

In a world that’s constantly accelerating, Miu Miu invites us to slow down. To sit in a park, to choose a book, to read. Not out of rhetoric, but out of beauty. With curated gestures, tactile details, and thoughtfully designed atmospheres. And if, in the meantime, we’re handed an iced coffee in a branded cup,  even better. This is the spirit behind Miu Miu Summer Reads 2025, now in its second edition: a project that celebrates the value of books, the power of female storytelling, and the tangible possibility of creating culture in an accessible, sensitive way. Summer Reads is a rare example of how fashion and content can not only coexist, but amplify one another. In a cultural landscape increasingly saturated with ephemeral events and prepackaged narratives, Miuccia Prada’s vision stands out for its authenticity and clarity. A free, refined yet approachable initiative, where the written word is treated with the same care and intention as a prêt-à-porter collection.

Open-air libraries: what happened during the event

The second edition of Miu Miu Summer Reads took place from June 27 to 29 in five major cities: Milan, Paris, Beijing, Osaka, and Hong Kong. The locations? Some of the most evocative parks in each city, from Giardino delle Arti in Milan to the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris’s second arrondissement, and the leafy Chaoyang Park in Beijing. Each space was transformed into an immersive reading environment: carefully designed kiosks, coordinated color palettes, Miu Miu logos translated into chromatic symbols and graphic signs. The goal was clear, to make reading not only accessible, but desirable, turning the act of opening a book into an aesthetic and sensory experience. Every visitor was invited to choose between two iconic novels, receiving a limited-edition copy personalized for the occasion. Each book featured an exclusive Miu Miu-designed cover, illustrated bookmarks, metallic bookends, and collectible ex libris stamps. A true editorial art object, restoring both the physical and symbolic value of the book. The atmosphere was intimate yet open, elegant yet unpretentious: folding chairs, benches, spaces for conversation, and staff dressed in Miu Miu uniforms, offering books and iced coffee in branded cups. The result? A reminder that culture can be a simple, beautiful, and everyday gesture.

The featured novels: two female voices speaking to the present

The selection of books was the conceptual heart of the entire project, as well as of the Miu Miu Literary Club, a one-night event held during Milan’s Salone del Mobile in April. For the 2025 edition, Miu Miu chose two novels written by women who, despite coming from vastly different cultural and geographical backgrounds, share a sharp, deep vision of female identity in the 20th century. The first is The Inseparables by Simone de Beauvoir, published posthumously in 2020 but written in the 1950s. A short yet powerful novel, it tells the story of two adolescent friends, Élène and Andrée, inspired by the real-life bond between the author and Zaza Mabille. An intimate, piercing narrative that explores identity, freedom, and the quiet struggle of women in a structurally male world. The second, offering a complementary but equally powerful perspective, is Onnazaka (The Waiting Years) by Fumiko Enchi, first published in 1957. The novel examines patriarchal oppression through the life of Tomo, a woman forced to find a concubine for her husband, a common practice in rigidly stratified Meiji-era Japan. The writing is refined yet brutal, revealing a deep, silent female resilience that transcends generations. Two very different stories. Two distant worlds. But one shared urgency: to express the female point of view in times and places where doing so was truly revolutionary.

A cultural project that’s accessible, global, and deeply necessary

Over the course of a single weekend, Miu Miu Summer Reads returned the book, and the act of reading, to the center of contemporary storytelling. Not as a nostalgic object, but as a living tool capable of sparking connection, inspiring questions, and opening new worlds. That’s what makes this project unique: its commitment to a high cultural vision, expressed through accessible means. It’s fashion that moves beyond the surface, engaging, quite literally, with content. Miuccia Prada, who has long believed that dressing is also an intellectual act, here turns to the slowest, most ancient medium of all, reading, to reshape the narrative around the brand. It’s not just style. It’s thought. It’s time. It’s space. And so, between a bookmark and an ex libris stamp, in some park in some global city, someone has started reading today. Maybe by chance. Maybe for fashion. But still, reading. And that, truly, is revolutionary.