Chicago’s NeoCon is the United States’ answer to Salone del Mobile, showcasing the latest innovations in commercial design from across the world.
June 27th, 2016
In 2016, NeoCon celebrated its 48th year with three days of seminars and showcases, attracting 50,000 design professionals to its events. Haworth were excited to be a part of the annual trade show, taking home a 2016 Best of NeoCon Silver Award, and showcasing more than 20 new products from Haworth and Haworth Collection.
The Haworth showroom again enlisted the design skills of Patricia Urquiola, a frequent collaborator with Haworth, and the designer behind Haworth’s Openest Collection. Filled with vibrant colours and the latest Haworth products, Urquiola focused on a central theme of ‘Culture, Community and Comfort: People Make the Place’.
“Our space centres on the workplace as a human centric environment, which we illustrated by creating a variety of work settings that allow people to work the way they need,” explains Glen Foster, Haworth’s Vice President for Sales and Marketing, “It celebrates bringing people together and creating a sense of community where people can perform at their best, acknowledging the needs of individuals to engage both socially, and for work purposes, to achieve maximum engagement.”
The highlights of the space were three prominent ‘Maker Spaces’, one each for Cappellini, Poltrona Frau, and Cassina in custom jewel boxes in the centre of the floor plate. In each of these showcases, a master craftsman demonstrated the skill in creating their respective brand’s chairs live, from start to finish, emphasising manufacturing values and design quality.
Also on display were several workspace set-ups, emphasising the easy integration of all of Haworth’s products, and a number of new Haworth Collection pieces, including Fern, Poppy, Drum, Immerse, and Compose Connections, with Compose Connections winning a Best of NeoCon Silver Award in the Systems Enhancements category. A bluescape wall of videos showcased the manufacturing process behind Haworth and Haworth Collection products, displaying Haworth’s global manufacturing values and design quality.
Another highlight of the showroom was the Fern display, which Glen Foster describes as, “a holistic museum approach to showcasing the design story and artefacts from the research and development of Fern.” The innovative chairs positioned as ‘the most comfortable task chair’ is displayed with a lush, background of paper ferns and multiple development prototypes for the chair, showcasing the chair’s evolution and superior design technology.
Haworth’s showspace for NeoCon 2016 was a spectacularly designed and highly interactive workspace that showcased the quality and versatility of Haworth’s products. Designed by Patricia Urquiola, and integrating the 2014 acquisitions of premium Italian brands Cassina, Poltrona Frau, and Cappellini, Haworth continues to be at the forefront of workspace design.
Haworth
ap.haworth.com
Glen Foster, Vice President of Sales & Marketing for Haworth Asia-Pacific together at Neocon with Sandro Rogani, master craftsman from Poltrona Frau from in Tolentino, Italy.
INDESIGN is on instagram
Follow @indesignlive
A searchable and comprehensive guide for specifying leading products and their suppliers
Keep up to date with the latest and greatest from our industry BFF's!
Gaggenau’s understated appliance fuses a carefully calibrated aesthetic of deliberate subtraction with an intuitive dynamism of culinary fluidity, unveiling a delightfully unrestricted spectrum of high-performing creativity.
BLANCOCULINA-S II Sensor promotes water efficiency and reduces waste, representing a leap forward in faucet technology.
It’s widely accepted that nature – the original, most accomplished design blueprint – cannot be improved upon. But the exclusive Crypton Leather range proves that it can undoubtedly be enhanced, augmented and extended, signalling a new era of limitless organic materiality.
In this candid interview, the culinary mastermind behind Singapore’s Nouri and Appetite talks about food as an act of human connection that transcends borders and accolades, the crucial role of technology in preserving its unifying power, and finding a kindred spirit in Gaggenau’s reverence for tradition and relentless pursuit of innovation.
The workplace strategist and environmental psychologist was in Sydney earlier this year to give a talk at Haworth on the fallacies of the ‘average’ in workplace design.
DKO’s Koos de Keijzer and Michael Drescher bring us this personal report from Salone del Mobile 2025 in Milan.
The internet never sleeps! Here's the stuff you might have missed
A major urban renewal project has been proposed for Sydney’s inner harbour, with developer Landream revealing plans for Pyrmont Place precinct designed by BVN.
The Altro Neurodiversity Forum 2025 gathered leading architects, designers, thought-leaders and advocates in March at the Manly Pacific Hotel in Sydney.
Redefining angularity of form as a welcoming architectural gesture, the multi-purpose learning hub at St Kevin’s College embraces the responsive geometry of light and shade to forge a profound connection with its urban locale.
The use of a single colour as the pivotal and defining design strategy, the unconventional application of contemporary colour on heritage projects, and the softening of traditionally ‘hard’ building typologies were observed in the winning projects at the 39th Dulux Colour Awards.