Best Of NeoCon Products

 The Merchandise Mart is so large in Chicago that it is hard to put my finger on my favorite products from the trip but I managed to pull something together! NeoCon focuses mainly on Commercial interior design with a heavy focus on contract furniture and floor coverings. Most of the Showrooms are year round spaces but some of them were temporary booths.

1. 18×36 Commercial Carpet Tile by Shaw Contract Group. In 4 great patterns: Fade, Overlay, Blur, and Laser Cut. The great selection is produced in eco-friendly Eco-Solution Q nylon on EcoWorx tile backing. This company has truly dominated the market for environmental story and aesthetics. Few others match them for the richness of their colors, quality, customer service (Thanks Celeste!) and the timelessness of their designs. I’m glad that they were the first to bring out the rectangular carpet tile and cant wait for samples to come out in the fall.
2. Joel Berman’s Heat lamp won Gold for decorative lighting at NeoCon. Heat is a light sculpture for designed interiors. Fashioned from a solitary 2 ¼ in. thick volume of acrylic resin, the luminaire is cast in Berman’s signature Arrigado texture, accented with brushed stainless steel hardware, and equipped with a high intensity LED light source.
3. Davis has created a great line of residential feeling contract furniture that is fully powered in delightful ways. I was also particularily struck by their bench seating- great form and quite conmfortable! Locally in Alberta you can find Davis through Solutions Workplace Furnishings, have a chat with Todd or Shannon and they can bring back some style to your outdated office space.
4. Kvadrat Maharam came out with this great vintage feeling nordic pattern in great colors called A Band Apart.
5. I can’t say enough how much I love Tai Ping Carpets. Their exploration of color and texture in wool and silk has been incredible to watch. Here is just one fine example of hand carving, color and play on textures. I can imagine anyone taking off their socks and shoes to run their toes through this piece. This company also suprised me this year by launching a luxury line of carpet tile called Innuendo.
6. Halcon came out of nowhere. I had never even heard of the company. Turns out they make high end Commercial and residential office furniture. As you can see by this image Simon was rather excited to see the clothes hanging space within the unit. Each and every element was customizable and teh drawers were all felt lined. The Proximus line was impecably detailed with the sliding workwall, eye height open filing, soft cloding drawers, ball bearing slider. The veratility and efficiency of this piece are well displayed and can benifit both the office piler and filer!
7. DIRTT (aka. Doing It Right This Time) certainly has blown me away. I had never seen an install until NeoCon and am shocked by how advanced their research and product line is. The clean lines and simple details of their project surely put it ahead of all other modular walls companies. These are truly living adaptable systems with infitite capabilities. I am not a health care designer nor have much interest to go that route but their healthcare display gave me infinite respect for how much work it must be to pull of an aesthetically pleasing, ergonomically correct compact hospital room that feels welcoming and clean. Congratulations DIRTT for opening my eyes!
8. Designed by Scott Wilson the SW_1 conference table for Coalesse is a great modern adaptation to the way we live and work. The casual work setting begs for comfort and flexibility as well as connectivity. This table allows a person to pull their table pad closer to them to make for a better posture and comfort when working with a laptop.
9. Jofco presented this piece in all white with a few pale blue accents but when I re-looked at it online in wood and black I was completely drawn. This piece is gorgeous and shoudl be a stand alone in any law firm or partners office. Its simple and uncluttered meant to show off stature and how critical the only desk accessory (the laptop) really is.
10. I was unfamiliar with Carvart until NeoCon 2010. nearly completely customizable the laminated glass can showcase images, materials, textures, graphics etc. in a sophisticated and elegant way. This large peice shown was of two faces with metallic sheer fabric in between giving the image a subtle and reflective quality to it that cannot be captured in photographs. Their website has some great closeups of what they can do. Turns out that they did Andres Escobars 11 Fulton as well as the Park Plaza in New York.
11. Poggenpohl makes luxury contemporary kitchens. I have been admiring the Porsche kitchen for a few years but it wasnt until visiting the Merchandise Mart in Chicago that I finally got to explore the design and truly appreciate it. The linearity of the design and integration of lighting as well as the assisted opening drawers and cabinets make you feel the qaulity and craftsmanship of the piece. Cabinets and drawers are divided by 5mm thick dark oak. Th eproporation of cabinet heights and depths is truly unique and ergonomic.
12. Poliform has a great collection of furniture, wardrobe and kitchen designs all in the same style but different proporations and aesthetics. I have used them in the past on a few projects overseas and am in love with particularily the Matrix collection (as shown in photo). There Grey-Dyed Oak is the most beautiful wood and finish I have seen and would love to have it for both my kitchen and wardrobe.