IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2012 - 27

Clockwise from left: Maya Romanoff and David Rockwell have a meeting of the minds. Amy lau’s Snowﬂake for Maya Romanoff. Orlando Diaz-Azcuy’s kenya table for hBF. Connected, designed by Corgan for Mannington Commercial. Barbara Barry’s Deco Jacquard for hBF Textiles.

finishes. Says Philippe Grohe, manager of Hansgrohe’s Axor brand of bath furnishings, “Designers are able to think of a room in its larger dimensions.” Regular sourcing provides interior designers with an intimate and nuanced knowledge of the marketplace, intel that manufacturers are eager to channel. “Interior designers specify on a daily basis, so they know what works and what doesn’t…and what voids need to be fi lled,” says Kevin Stark, HBF’s vice president of who have reaped the benefits of those successful partnerships; artisans working design. Some of the company’s best sellers have been by interior designers; Barbara in Maya Romanoff’s Skokie, Illinois, Barry, Orlando Diaz-Azcuy, and Gensler’s workshop were likewise energized Lisa Bottom are among those who’ve by the process and motivated to push developed collections—and shared with the boundaries of their craft. Stark their granular knowledge of the Marinating in the minutiae of a product-sphere. “Much of the end-user particular product category can make it feedback designers relate to us is about challenging for a manufacturer to keep functionality or comfort, and it’s often sight of big-picture issues. “I need people quite technical—how chair arms get who are looking into the forest because rubbed, for instance, or that they’d like I’m deep inside it,” is how HBF Textiles conference seats to self-center,” he design director Mary Jo Miller puts it. explains. Such wisdom not only helps HBF “Working with outside designers forces us to take a step back and look at ourselves develop better products and improve more critically. They bring their insights, existing ones, it has also influenced the brand’s approach to entire product and we bring a more regimented approach to evaluating our competitors.” categories. “Needs are changing so rapidly Two heads are infinitely better than one. these days. Products need to offer opportunities for collaboration, flexibility, Natalie Jones, Mannington Commercial’s vice president of brand and and modularity,” Stark continues. “Interior designers are right there on creative product, elaborates. “A flooring the firing lines.” manufacturer can get narrowly focused And tapped into the zeitgeist, adds on what’s happening in the floor-covering industry, instead of developing something Miller. “They provide so much more than just insights about things like color new that transcends the genre.” That philosophy accounts for the brand’s recent trends,” she says. “Interior designers are really in tune with broader cultural liaisons with Corgan to produce shifts.” That ability to switch back and Connected—a modular carpet line for forth between the big picture and the adaptive, open floor plans—and with minute details, the macro and the micro, HOK to produce Vivendi, an amalgam the concept and the execution, makes of resilient sheet flooring and carpeting interior designers ideal sounding boards. that capitalizes on trends of well-being, luxury, and domesticity for healthcare projects. Of course, a visionary in any discipline could offer a manufacturer a dose of outside perspective. But what interior designers bring to the table specifically is an unparalleled understanding of context. They can visualize how a product will be experienced in a space and how it will read vis-à-vis other materials and

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2012