Richard: Dear Readers, we’re back once again from the Furniture Market, and offering our take on what’s new and hot; what’s old and not. And I’m not referring to anything my partner chose to wear on the trip.
Jean: Thank you, Richard. For the record, I’ll not say anything about your “attired” wardrobe, either. But home furnishings is very much a fashion industry, and part of our mission was to pay close attention to design trends. One observation we both made was that (no big surprise) buyer traffic was down.
Richard: Well, 20% of furniture purchases are for new homes, and we all know that home sales are suffering at the moment. The state of the economy isn’t helping manufacturing operations, either. So there’s good reason for traffic to be down, and it helps explain why much of what we saw was, well, familiar.
Jean: True. As we saw in the spring, there were a lot of eco-friendly and natural materials, and on the other side of the fashion spectrum, a lot of glitz and glamour. Metallic colors and textures were featured in fabrics, rugs, and even ceramics, and rich linens and velvets were employed in upholstery and drapery.
Richard: Sometimes that yen and yang of earthy and sparkle work together. For example, one table I saw featured a whitewashed, roughhewn top with polished stainless steel legs (and if you want one at the retail price of $10,000 give us a call!) We also saw some retro designs, like some chrome and Plexiglas pieces that may have been beamed to High Point from the starship Enterprise or people who are still watching that.
Jean: I saw them too, but I wouldn’t say they represented a trend. What is very much a trend though is the color palette, which has been constant for two Markets now. Blush pinks and earth tones, blacks and whites. I should say “charcoal and white,” because charcoal seems to be the new black.
Richard: I noticed an evolution in surface textures—a couple of years ago shiny black lacquer was popular, then it was replaced with shiny white lacquer, and this time there were some antique French reproductions finished in flat white. It gave them a contemporary look.
Jean: As a matter of fact, there seemed to be a lot of flat whites and pastels featured on furniture this time. It’s fair to say there have been some fashion changes, but they’re subtle.
Richard: I think we’re also seeing a subtle change in promotional direction, too. There are fewer celebrity designers these days—or I should say celebrities chosen to represent designs. For the most part, those design celebrities present were real designers.
Jean: Yes, and one of my personal heroes was there—Bob Mackie. Most people remember him for his costume designs for divas like Cher, or for his work on the Carol Burnett Show. It was Mackie who gave us that hilarious parody of Gone With the Wind, with Burnett as Scarlet descending the stairs dressed in green velvet drapes, with the drapery rod still attached at her shoulders. “I saw this in the window and just had to have it!” Bob said that was just another weekly assignment for him. We asked him what future trends he saw for the home furnishings industry. He answered us with a gracious smile and twinkling eyes. “I have no idea.”