May, 2009

Design — Comments Off
29
May 09

ICFF 2009

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make it to ICFF this year, but Roxanne Hanna (Merida’s Director of Sales) filled me in on all her exciting findings! Here’s a brief overview of some of the fun, innovative companies that we were inspired by:

Unison

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  • Love the beautifully printed bedding, throw pillows and table linens.

Misewell

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  • Misewell’s clean and simplistic designs were refreshing. The pops of color really catch your eye!

Rachel O’Neill

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  • Loopla Shade – Sculpted out of Velcro strips! It looks great in Bergdorf Goodman’s NY space – pictured right.

Peter Harrison – The Lavassa Line

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  • Steel, wood, concrete and glass are combined to form unique tables, benches and home accessories.

Camilla Meijer

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  • Hand drawn, nature inspired textiles ranging from wallpapers, lampshades and pillows.

Uhuru

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  • Amazing tree trunk tables with a highlighted stitch holding the seams together! Uhuru is a great furniture company that is dedicated to sustainability.

Mai Oersted

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  • Incredible hand blown glass sculptures. I love the swan chandelier pictured above.

To read and view more about ICFF 2009, Inhabitat and Metropolis also have great posts from the show.

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Sustainability — 2 Comments
29
May 09

GoodGuide: helping you make sustainable shopping choices

Socially and environmentally concerned consumers are often puzzled about how to make responsible shopping choices. Information about how companies treat their workers, contribute to their local communities and manage their environmental and social impact are rarely available on product packaging or in stores, making it extremely difficult to make well-informed shopping choices on the fly.supermarket-aisle

As someone who wants to use my purchasing power to support companies I admire, I was thrilled to discover a new web site – and accompanying iPhone application – called GoodGuide. GoodGuide rates thousands of products with comprehensive and easy-to-understand data points. Each product is rated according to things like the health or nutrition of the product and the environmental and social performance of the company that makes it. The site also provides lists of similar question_markproducts and their ratings for comparison.

GoodGuide has put together more than 80 million data points from different databases that evaluate products and companies. The company considers transparency to be of the utmost importance, and it iheader_logos committed to providing users with details about their rating methodologies and database sources. It is all in the site.

GoodGuide is currently in “beta” mode, and lists products in four categories: food, personal care, household cleaners, and toys, but the site will soon be expanding to cover additional areas. I find the site incredibly helpful, especially when I’m standing in the supermarket trying to make a decision. Check it out!

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Products — Comments Off
26
May 09

Our newest expertise

Custom rugs have been our core business for more than 30 years, and our talented craftsmen are always looking for new ways to customize rugs to provide unique and interesting options for designing a room. We recently perfected the art of the circular Viewpoint rug and wanted to share a few photos of the fabulous results!

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Spotty Dots in Sepia, 3' round rug with center seam

“A round rug can bring unity to a room. It becomes a focal point by creating softer edges that contrast with more linear elements in a room like furniture and windows.” -Maegan Fee, Merida Creative Director

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Here is a look at the finishing method we use for the back side of the rug. The edges are carefully folded and sewn down, and a cotton tape is glued and ironed on for a clean, tailored look.

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Finally, here is a close-up view of the hand-sewn seam that runs down the middle of the rug. Our craftsmen use special fishhook needles for this labor-intensive task.

The 100% New Zealand Wool rugs in the Viewpoint collection can be custom-colored and fabricated into circular rugs up to 12′ in diameter. If you are interested in learning more about our custom capabilities or if you would like to place an order for a custom Viewpoint rug of your own, please call our Sales Support team at 800-345-2200.

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Design — Comments Off
20
May 09

RISD President’s House

Earlier this year Merida visited the Rhode Island School of Design president’s house to meet with John Maeda (RISD President), Pat Brown (Media + Partners), and Beth Garvin (VP of Institutional Engagement). They were in the midst of furnishing the house and were eager to place Merida rugs!

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John’s goal is to fill the first floor, which is used to bring members of the RISD community together, with furniture, textiles, accessories and artwork, all created by RISD alumni.  Of course, I was excited to give back to my alma matter and to see the designs in such a beautiful space at RISD!

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After presenting, Merida learned that RISD had a meeting scheduled with the Target Corporation for the following week – the house was in dire need of rugs.  We were able to quickly make and ship two Bricks rugs from our Structure Collection for delivery before their event.

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Below, John speaks about our visit in his presentation about RISD, Start Engaging Here, at Knoll’s Boston showroom. It was great to hear how pleased he was with the results!

You can also check out John’s post, Merida Meridian Marvelous, on RISD’s blog.

We still have some additional rugs we hope to place in the home such as, Links in Butterscotch for the dining room, Hydrangea Lime Light for the living room, and Folk Bitter Chocolate for the library. It’s going to look fantastic!

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