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So what's cool and edgy?
A
California designer tours the housewares show and picks out a few
favorites A
trip to Chicago proved fruitful for a California designer seeking all
that's new for her West Coast clients. Angela
Beach of Beachwood Designs in Los Angeles found $20 educational shower
curtains, $300 sheets and an $850 bird's nest style rattan chair at the
International Home & Housewares Show this week. The
designer frequently checks out trade shows because her clients want
cutting-edge designs and gadgets. "I'm
looking for ideas for my clients," she said. "Most of my
clients want the newest for their homes." And
who are her clients? Anyone we've heard of? Yes, she insists, some are
Hollywood celebrities, but Beach said she is under contract not to so
much as whisper a name. But
she did share what items caught her eye among more than 2,000 exhibits
in three buildings at Chicago's McCormick Place. Entrepreneurs,
manufacturers and importers exhibit at trade shows to find outlets for
their wares, so some products are not available yet. Company Web sites
are often a way to find stores that carry items. Damask
sheets made from tree pulp are "one of the nicest bedding products
I've seen in a long time," Beach said. Beach
thinks the sheets are a bargain at $300, and said her clients would pay
$2,000 for bedding that soft and beautiful. Laiyi
Reese of Bourbonnais has the sheets made in China for L & R Home
Collection, but they are not yet available at retail. The
chairs that Beach spotted are from Golden Triangle in Chicago. The
dark rattan chair from Thailand that looks like it might have been
molded by birds is surprisingly comfortable, she said. "I
would use this in a living room in a heartbeat," she said. "I
don't know how it would last outside, but maybe in a covered area." She
described the chair as very Zen. "Zen
is really in," Beach said. "The whole Asian thing is getting
really popular again." Smoother
armless blonde rattan chairs also attracted her attention, but she said
she would use one as an accent piece, rather than a dining room chair. "It
seems a little low for a dining room chair, but it's a really cool
chair, and maybe you'd have a table that's a little lower." Children's
rooms are favorites for this mother of two, who spotted cute swings in
the booth of Sassafras Enterprises Inc. of Chicago. The
$20 leaf and ladybug swings would be great in children's rooms, said
Beach, who added that her 6-year-old daughter has a swing in her own
room. And
how about painted "throne" potty chairs for little princes or
princesses with a toilet paper roll on one side of the chair and a
magazine rack on the other. The
chairs retail for about $80 from Teamson Design Group, Edgewood, N.Y. "It's
really hard to find cute kids' stuff that's not like really
stupid," she said. For
a teen room she found a $100 "smooch" chair - pink velvet lips
- from LumiSource of Elk Grove Village that she labeled
"hysterical." The
firm also is selling neon framed mirrors in the shape of a heart and
lips that will retail for $50. If
your teen spends inordinate amounts of time in the shower and bathroom,
how about learning definitions from the SAT test between day dreams? Intuitive
Learning Co. of New York started out with shower curtains with 100
definitions on them. Other versions display grammar rules and math
concepts. CB2
in Chicago sells the curtains, which also are available online, for
about $20 each. Shifting
to a living room or family room, the aqua planter from Asa Selection of
Germany would look great on a coffee table, Beach said. Retailing
for about $50, it is part of a dinnerware collection that comes in
white, black and an aqua that the designer says is a very current shade. "It's
a pretty, girly color," Beach said. "I would use it with white
and brown." Also
for sophisticated tastes, she found leather frames from Christopher
Enterprises Corp. of Taiwan or Z. Living of San Francisco that retail
for $30 to $40. "They're
very pretty in a grouping like that," Beach said. "The green
one you wouldn't even need to put pictures in, I like it so much." She
liked the company's little dark wooden table in a C shape. A few of the
$140 pieces could be arranged horizontally and vertically for display,
storage and even a bench. Beach
said dark wood is the look these days. Four
panels of woven plastics that resemble rattan hang from a track to serve
as a curtain, but Beach said she liked them as a room divider. Together
the four are a little less than 7 feet wide. The retail price is $130. The
products are available from mail-order catalogs. And
SoHo Spices Inc. of New York City offers simply brilliant storage
systems for those little things in kitchens or home offices. A
metal panel is attached to the wall or maybe a strip of metal sits on a
desk. Then small round canisters with magnetic bottoms stick on. They
come in stainless steel or colors and could even click on a
refrigerator. The
canisters are for items like paper clips and tacks or in a shakable
version for spices. A
large set with 20 spice shakers and a panel is $200 from an online
retailer. Some
of the products are at Cooks of Crocus Hill at Marshall Field's. For
anyone who is California dreaming, Palm Island Products of Tampa, Fla.,
presents a hammock held up by two palm trees. The
trees can survive temperatures down to 40 degrees below zero and have
been used in theme parks, said Steve Warren, president. The
trees are pricey though, and can cost $2,800. |
