interfaceflor folio no. 3
DESCRIPTION
Twenty-eight years after Memphis woke the design world from its slumber, InterfaceFLOR is bringing the fun to NeoCon World's Trade Fair with its inspired Memphis Collection.TRANSCRIPT
20BACKSTORY:
LIGHTS, CAMERAS, AUGMENTED REALITY!
This year’s Memphis-inspired product lines made “play” a key
part of the launch strategy. This behind the scenes look at
the making of the digital campaign (a carpet industry first) shows
you how a product based in design history became the
catalyst for a futuristic advertising campaign.
18
08
OA
KE
Y C
OLLE
CT
ION
:M
EM
PH
IS U
ND
ER
FO
OT
Oakey’s newest product line could be his boldest and
brightest vision yet. So why does he use words like “fun” and “play” to describe it? Seeing is believing.
© 2010 interface flor, llc. mission zero and the mission zero mark are trademarks of interface, inc.
A REAL PAGE TURNER
04A MEMPHIS POINT OF VIEw
Thirty years afterMemphis Design turned the world
upside down, it hasinspired a wholenew generation
of designers to play with color from the ground up.
LAUNCH ME AT AR.INTERFACEFLOR.COM
Real carpet becomes augmented reality—an industry first—when you hold
this new Memphis Pattern Library tile to your webcam on our AR site.
Get ready for the style (and dimensional) experience of your life.
OF
F O
IL:
TH
E F
OLIO
IN
TE
RV
IEw
Peter
Gre
ene t
alks
abo
ut su
stain
abili
ty’s e
lepha
nt in
the
room
(hin
t: it’
s OIL
) and
the c
ompa
ny’s
plan
to ge
t off
oil
entir
ely by
202
0. B
ON
US:
Hea
r abo
ut N
omkh
ubul
wane
, a
1.3-to
n ele
phan
t scu
lptu
re a
nd sy
mbo
l of e
co-re
spon
sibili
ty,
appe
arin
g with
Inter
face
FLO
R a
t Neo
Con.
2010AUGMENTEDREALITY(INDUSTRY PREMIER)
“Look out there, there is a new landscape…if you want to, you can take a walk there.”
—Ettore SottsassAPRIL 1994
IF THESE cEIlIngS cOUlD TAlK
PHOTOgRAPH BY FRAnçOIS HAlARD
MAkING ROOM FOR A MEMPHIS
POINT OF vIEw
THIRTY YEARS AFTER MEMPHIS DESIGN FIRST LIT UP MILAN, IT HAS INSPIRED A wHOLE NEw GENERATION OF DESIGNERS TO PLAY wITH COLOR
FROM THE GROUND UP. DIANNA EDwARDS LOOkS AT THE BOLD AS BRASS, RULE-BREAkING, FREEDOM-SEEkING, DESIGN MOvEMENT THAT BEGAN
wITH ETTORE SOTTSASS AND BOB DYLAN.
05
Interior by kelly wearstler, Inc. kelly wearstler is the founder of the Los Angeles-based architectural interior design firm kwID. Her eclectic and glamorous style evokes Memphis in its combination of materials, color, form, and finishes. Ms. wearstler is the author of three books: Modern Glamour; Domi-cilium Decoratus; and Hue.
OP
PO
SIT
E P
AG
E,
FAR
LE
FT: V
ersa
ce s
tack
ed s
tile
tto
in M
emph
is p
alet
te; S
titc
h fo
ldin
g ch
air
by A
dam
Goo
drum
in a
Mem
phis
pal
ette
. TH
IS P
AG
E,
TOP
RO
w,
LEFT
: Dia
ne V
on F
urst
enbe
rg h
andb
ag; S
otts
ass
obje
ct, c
irca
198
3; M
IDD
LE: E
lly
Jack
son
of L
a R
oux
on r
etro
Mem
phis
set
in c
onte
mpo
rary
fa
shio
ns b
y H
ouse
of
Hol
land
, UK
. Fro
m t
he B
ulle
tpro
of v
ideo
, 200
9. F
ashi
ons,
Hou
se o
f H
olla
nd, U
K. B
OTT
OM
LE
FT:
Sott
sass
sta
ndin
g lu
min
ere,
198
2; P
rous
t G
eom
etri
ca a
rmch
air,
1978
, rew
orke
d by
Cap
pell
lini
in a
cot
ton
fabr
ic b
y Al
essa
ndro
Men
dini
and
han
d-fi
nish
ed w
ith
untr
adit
iona
l fi
nish
es.
07
1979America is gray. Three Mile Island evokes nuclear night-mares. Oil spills pollute the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. Mortgage rates hit 15.25 percent and keep climb-ing. The country learns a new word – terrorism – courtesy of Iran. The collective conscious-ness is deadly serious.
1980Italy is beige. Milan, one of the world’s most visual cities, bows to the modernist dogma of the time: simple, plain, minimal. Beige minimalism rules. All this in this ancient city of the Romans; this city birthing Armani, versace, and Dolce & Gabbana. Ettore Sottsass has had enough. He is a great designer, already leg-end, a man known for vision throughout his career. Sottsass has had his fill of despair and the shapes and colors it has wreaked upon design. If you think this approach to a story about a design move-ment named for a Bob Dylan song overly dramatic, you are forgiven. How else to introduce a change so vital and alive that it continues to influence and enhance contemporary life today?
To bring vibrant color, wit, and total freedom of expression into design in 1980—when it was ruled by
“form equals function” dogma —took no small amount of passion and charisma. Even for a designer at the top of his game. Ettore Sottsass already had a solid body of work to his credit. His cherry red “valentine” typewriter for Olivetti had turned an
industrial machine into pop culture, foreshadowing Apple’s
“flavored” iMacs thirty years later. He had traveled India, Burma, Thailand, and Nepal learning vernacular textures, dyes, and techniques. His brief time as a pivotal member of Studio Alchimia in the mid-1970s had proved too intel-lectual—too much talk and too little design. He moved on.
The Memphis Movement began simply, with Sottsass assembling colleagues (all architects under thirty) to plan a furniture collection he’d been commissioned to do. Over many glasses of good Italian wine, the ques-tion arose: when the whole world is beige, is more beige the answer? More beige sofas, more eternally monochromatic carpets? wasn’t it the time to, as Barbara Radice put it,
“imagine other lives”?You know the answer.
The group chose its name—Memphis—because in the growing excitement, no one cared that Bob Dylan’s
“Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again” played repeatedly that night. Ironically, the name had other appealing cultural con-notations. It was the ancient capital of Egypt and, of course, the birthplace of Elvis Presley. Cultural oxymorons perhaps, but then so was Memphis.
when they met again, the group shared hundreds of drawings for furniture and lighting, each wilder and more colorful than the next. They seemed to believe wholesale in Marlon Brando’s ‘wild One’ philosophy of rebellion:
“whaddya got?” whatever signaled “real design,” the
Memphis Group steered away from it, choosing instead mate-rials from celluloid to sheet metal; laminate and sparkle flake finishes; fluid, playful forms; and motifs from kitsch to pop art.
At the Salone del Mobile of Milan (the world’s most prestigious furniture fair), Memphis and its members were treated as rock stars. Thousands came from all over the world to see furnishings blazing with flashy colors, geo-metric and natural patterns, leopard-skin prints, neon tubes, spangles, and glitter.
Critical reaction was radically divided. Memphis was loved or hated, but rarely anything in between. Regardless, exhibitions were mounted in London, Los Angeles, Tokyo, San Francisco, New York, and again in Milan. America’s Michael Graves and other notables soon joined the collective, but Sottsass, disturbed by the media circus, soon departed.
“I am a designer and I want to design things,” he once wrote. He designed jewelry, ceramics, buildings, furniture, and more until his death in 2007.
2010we are back in Mobile again, with Memphis’ vivid colors and black and white optical patterns appearing in fashion, film, lighting, and on the streets all around us. (Foremost in InterfaceFLOR®’s new Memphis-inspired product line. See the interview with designer David Oakey on page 08.)
But there are many other examples: Nike’s new Memphis-style neon logo
treatment in the heart of New York City. England’s passion-for-fashion designer, Henry Holland (houseof-holland.co.uk) whose irrev-erent tees and street-smart prints won him Barney’s heart and London’s acclaim. Danish kitchenware company Bodum’s release, twenty-four years after its creation, of a Sottsass Memphis teakettle.
Even California-based kelly wearstler, the interior designer who stole the show on Bravo’s Top Design and furnishes some of California’s most glamorous hotels, has chosen Memphis “First” chairs for her home.
why? Because at its heart, Memphis style was, and is, about personal free-dom. It was decades ahead of the true Global village yet incorporated patterns and motifs and colors of many cultures. The Memphis foun-dation of black-and-white geo-metric and nature-inspired optical patterns provides a natural foundation for any décor to receive an injection of the whimsical, wonderful jolt of color.
And then there is the joy. There was so much sheer fun in the Memphis pieces from the past and the contemporary interpretations today.
Ettore Sottsass himself felt that human beings were connected, in a very real sense, with their surroundings. In Design Metaphors, he wrote,
“It may occur to someone working in design to produce objects...that serve to release creative energies. To suggest possibilities. To stimulate awareness. To bring people’s feet back onto the planet.”
OH MAMA, CAN THIS REALLY BE?
YOU DON’T HAvE TO OwN, OR EvEN
HAvE SEEN, A MEMPHIS DESIGN FOR IT TO AFFECT
YOU SOONER OR LATER. TRUE
TwENTY-EIGHT YEARS AGO AND TRUE TODAY. IN
SOME qUARTERS, MEMPHIS IS
CREDITED AS THE GENESIS FOR
THE wHOLE 1980S PERSONALITY. ALL
THAT ATTITUDE, DARING, NEON
GRAPHICS—EvEN MADONNA—HAD TO COME FROM
SOMEwHERE. wAS IT MEMPHIS?
06
to it. This Memphis-inspired product line represents David Oakey’s—and InterfaceFLOR’s—most singularly committed intersection of art and science to date. “what I want is to inspire people. To shake people up and say, ‘Let’s have fun again. Let’s be playful again.’ That’s an important part of the image I wanted to portray.” The line’s inspiration is, of course, the Memphis Movement led by Sottsass in 1980. while the world may be full of Memphis
inspiration today, in early 2008, that wasn’t the case. Like most market-driven d e s i g n e rs a n d a r t i s t s , David Oakey and his fash-ion analyst, Cindi Oakey, work a lmos t two y ears ahead of trend. So when Oakey and Oakey began their thinking, Memphis was not on the radar. But all of a sudden, says Oakey, the couple began seeing colors and styles that were reminiscent of Memphis popping up in the first place most fashion appears: the streets.
“we saw f lashes of i t in the clothes on the streets of New York,” says Oakey.
“In places l ike Topshop. Cindi would say, ‘Look
how bright this is,’ and I responded, ‘That’s Memphis, you know.’” (A Lon-don fashion authority since the mid-1960s, Topshop just recently opened its flagship store on Broadway in Soho.) Cindi Oakey remembered own-ing Memphis pieces in the 1980s but not realizing what they were. Sadly for her collector husband, those pieces are long gone. Memphis furnishings of any kind command high prices on the market today. Just check the price of a Sottsass Nilo vase from 1983 on Unicahome.com: around $1,073.
ART AND SOLE:
09
IN THE STUDIO wITH DAVID OAKEY
David Oakey’s newest canvas was under his feet when we met at his studio this winter. He was busy mixing the bold, colored stripes from Beale Street™ with the widest black and white strokes from Union Ave™ to study the effect. It reminded me of a Paul klee rug I’ve seen only once, in a design anthology. Oakey iscomfortable walking on beautiful things. He has designed every InterfaceFLOR product line since 1994, and his art (which the commercial carpet indus-try holds in high regard) is meant to be used. And, on occasion, abused.But this, his newest work, has special meaning even for Oakey. It is an homage of sorts to designer Ettore Sottsass, dead now some three years; celebrated still and probably for many years to come for the revlu-tionary design group and movement he led in Milan dur ing th e 1980s . Called “Memphis” after a Bob Dylan song, Sott-sass and his band of merry c o - c o n s p i ra t o rs b ro k e through a wall of utilitar-ian modernist design with willfully provocative pat-terns and color so bright i t was almost shocking. I take that back: it wAS shocking. Memphis elevated motifs and materials and color combinations that had been relegated to the design basement for decades. And in the process, designers themselves were liberated. “I look now at what Sottsass did then with Memphis, and I appreciate it so much,” says David Oakey. “He was sixty-two years old then; the ‘in’ designer in Milan, and he just completely shook things up. For me to tell his story just one more time is very important to me.” Oakey isn’t just retelling the Memphis story he is adding
08
PRODUCT: Doodle™ mixed with Memphis to Milan and Back™ Pattern Library
Revel in the Current State of Play
ALL PHOTOGRAPHY BY GEOF KERN
13
PRODUCT, LEFT: Memphis to Milan and Back™ Pattern Library mixed with Union Avenue™ RIGHT: Memphis to Milan and Back™ Pattern Library
12
OPTICAL ALLUSIONS
It’s Time to Think Inside the Box
PRODUCT: Union Avenue™ mixed with Beale Street™
15
CREATE MOVING IMAGES
Rock the Ground You walk On
14
INT
ER
FAC
EF
LO
R’S
ME
MP
HIS
IN
SP
IRE
D P
RO
DU
CT
LIN
E:
AN
OV
ER
VIE
w
01–
10: M
emph
is t
o M
ilan
and
Bac
k™ P
atte
rn L
ibra
ry B
lack
-and
-whi
te o
rgan
ical
ly in
spire
d op
tical
illu
sion
pat
tern
s des
igne
d to
wor
k to
geth
er. 1
1–14
: Uni
on A
venu
e™ (b
lack
and
wh
ite
stri
ped
tile
var
iati
ons)
15–
18: B
eale
Str
eet™
(bla
ck a
nd c
olor
ed s
trip
ed
tile
var
iati
ons)
Var
iatio
ns w
ithin
varia
tions
des
igne
d to
wor
k tog
ethe
r or m
ake m
usic
with
tile
s fro
m th
e Mem
phis
to M
ilan
and
Back
Pat
tern
Li
brar
y. 19
–24
: Doo
dle™
Bol
d, gr
aphi
c col
ors w
ith vi
sual
text
ure t
o spa
re. C
olor
way
s pla
nned
to h
arm
oniz
e with
the s
trip
es in
Uni
on A
venu
e and
Be
ale S
tree
t and
pro
vide
vivi
d con
tras
t to t
he bl
ack a
nd w
hite
optic
al p
atte
rns i
n th
e Pat
tern
Lib
rary
. Add
ition
al co
lorw
ays a
vaila
ble.
13 17 21
14 18 22
15 19 23
16 20
24
FO
R M
OR
E I
NF
OR
MA
TIO
N R
EG
AR
DIN
G I
NT
ER
FAC
EF
LO
R P
RO
DU
CT
S,
VIS
IT:
ww
w.I
NT
ER
FAC
EF
LO
R.C
OM
TH
ES
E P
RO
DU
CT
S A
RE
ON
LY A
VA
ILA
BL
E I
N N
OR
TH
AN
D S
OU
TH
AM
ER
ICA
17
The
resu
ltin
g O
akey
Mem
phis
in
spir
ed p
rodu
ct li
nes a
re so
per
-fec
tly a
ttune
d to
the w
orld
s of a
rt
and
fash
ion
that
they
coul
d ha
ng
on th
e wal
ls a
t MoM
A. L
ovel
y th
ough
t, b
ut th
at is
not
wha
t th
ey a
re d
esig
ned
for.
They
are
des
igne
d fo
r joy
.
Abov
e all
else
, the
se a
re I
nter
face
FLO
R p
rodu
cts.
So w
hen
push
com
es to
sh
ove,
they
are
as m
uch
abou
t per
form
ance
as
they
are
abo
ut fa
shio
n.
Thes
e pro
duct
s sho
uld
beco
me t
he n
ew, n
ot-re
d ca
rpet
s of H
olly
woo
d.Th
ey sh
ould
dec
orat
e ho
tels
in S
an F
ran-
cisc
o or
Los
Ang
eles
, of
fice
bui
ldin
gs i
n N
ew Y
ork,
scho
ols i
n At
lant
a, re
stau
rant
s in
Chi
cago
, and
civi
c ce
nter
s in
Dal
las.
Th
e firs
t visu
al im
pact
MO
RE
MO
RE
MO
RE
DA
VID
01
09
05
02
1006
03
1107
04
1208
desi
gn a
low
pro
file t
o he
lp th
e pro
duct
be h
igh
per-
form
ance
. So
we g
et th
e tex
ture
into
the v
isua
l.”
Anot
her a
spec
t Oak
ey li
kes a
bout
this
new
pro
duct
lin
e is i
ts m
utab
ility
. All
Inte
rfac
eFLO
R st
yles
can
be
mix
ed a
nd m
atch
ed, t
rue,
but w
ith th
is li
ne, t
he p
lay-
fuln
ess o
f the
pro
duct
itse
lf se
ems t
o enc
oura
ge it
.“w
hen
I lo
ok a
t the
Car
lton
boo
kshe
lf [
Sott
sass
’ ic
on o
f the
Mem
phis
Mov
emen
t], i
t loo
ks li
ke ca
rpet
ti
le s
tack
ed u
p in
br
ight
, dif
fere
nt c
ol-
ors.
If I
coul
d un
fold
it
and
lay i
t on
the f
loor
, it
wou
ld be
like
mix
ing
solid
s and
text
ures
and
pa
ttern
s on
the f
loor
. It
just
scre
ams m
odul
ar
carp
et.”
The C
arl-
ton
book
shel
f do
es
evok
e mod
ular
carp
et.
And
just
$6,
000
can
buy
you
one
at f
ur-
nitu
rest
oreb
log.
com
. B
ut fo
r a
muc
h m
ore
reas
onab
le p
rice
, you
16
one
abso
rbs
abou
t th
ese p
rodu
cts i
s the
ir
colo
r. Th
e se
cond
is
text
ure.
The p
rodu
cts
are t
extu
ral—
ther
e are
sli
ght v
aria
tions
in th
e he
ight
of t
he fi
bers
—bu
t for
the m
ost p
art,
the
text
ural
look
is
an op
tical
illu
sion.
One
w
e ho
pe e
ven
Ett
ore
Sotts
ass w
ould
appl
aud.
Th
is i
llus
ion
is
achi
eved
with
the h
elp
of n
ew t
echn
olog
y de
velo
ped
spec
ifica
lly
by I
nter
face
FL
OR
. An
Inn
ovat
ion,
say
s D
avid
Oak
ey, t
hat g
ives
the c
ompa
ny th
e abi
lity
to
deliv
er sh
arp
text
ural
pat
tern
s but
still
mai
ntai
n a
low
pro
file i
n th
e tile
itse
lf.O
akey
like
s tha
t ill
usio
nary
asp
ect o
f the
pro
duct
s. “P
eopl
e lov
e tex
-tu
re b
ecau
se w
e all
wan
t to
touc
h an
d fe
el. B
ut w
e
can
live w
ith g
reat
art
th
at y
ou c
an r
eint
er-
pret
ever
yday
: Oak
ey’s
mas
terp
iece
s.“P
eo-
ple c
an ju
st p
lay w
ith
this
and
be a
s bol
d as
th
ey w
ant,”
says
Oak
ey.
“Tha
t’s a
noth
er th
ing
that
conn
ecte
d m
e with
th
e Mem
phis
styl
e. Yo
u ca
n ta
ke s
olid
col
ors
from
ano
ther
pro
duct
lin
e of t
extu
re, m
aybe
ad
d in
a l
ittl
e pa
t-te
rn, a
nd d
o it
rig
ht
on th
e flo
or. M
emph
is is
the w
hole
conc
ept o
f pl
ayin
g w
ith th
e pro
d-uc
ts a
nd se
eing
wha
t you
can
crea
te.”
“Pla
y” is
a
child
like w
ord,
but
wha
t it r
epre
sent
s her
e is n
ot.
Oak
ey a
nd In
terf
aceF
LOR
hav
e put
per
sona
l fre
edom
, cr
eativ
e ene
rgy,
and
the c
onst
ant s
timul
atio
n of
art
no
t jus
t with
in o
ur g
rasp
, but
als
o un
der o
ur fe
et.
1 . USE LESS ENERGY
“Using less” is a simple idea that has been part of our core busi-ness philosophy for 15 years. Since 1996, our total energy use in North America is down 38%. Just as important, today 44% of our total energy use comes from renewable sources. One example is our landfill gas project, which uses landfill gas instead of natural gas to power some of our LaGrange, GA, operations. 2. USE LESS MATERIAL
“Using less” is a principle that influences the design and manu-facturing of all our products—for the better. Since 1995, we’ve reduced the amount of nylon fiber in our carpet tile by 15% and improved its performance at the same time. Nylon is petroleum based so the less we use, the better. It will help us get off oil. 3. MAKE IT BEAUTIFUL; MAKE IT LAST
Beauty and performance are fundamental to us for practical reasons. It doesn’t matter how ‘green’ a carpet tile is unless its
style sensibility is relevant. Just as it wouldn’t prove comforting to know a product could be recycled if it needed to be replaced too soon. Making high-style, high-performance products that last isn’t just basic to sustainability. It’s basic to our business philosophy.
4. TURN BACKING INTO BACKING
Turning old products into new products is a critical step in our plan to get off oil. For thirteen years, we’ve been reclaiming and recycling old carpet backing into material we use to make new carpet backing. Our process for turning old backing into new backing (a product we call GlasBac®RE) increases our recycled content. This, in turn, reduces our dependence on oil and has allowed us to create a robust carpet reclamation and recycling program.
5. TURN FIBER INTO FIBER
working with recycled nylon has the potential to reduce global
warming effects by 36% when compared to traditional nylon. Since 1997 we’ve been recycling not just the nylon used in our products but those of our competitors as well—both types 6 and 6,6. This means we can provide clean, post-consumer raw material to create our Convert carpet tile designs as well as provide it to other industries. This is a major technological breakthrough not just for us, but also for the carpet industry as a whole.
OFF OIL: THE RIGHT THING TO DO
Regardless of the debates over peak oil, the discovery of new oil sources and extraction techniques, we know this much is true: The less dependent we become on oil as a resource, the more secure we are as a company and the more stable our prices. Ultimately, it protects the earth we live on not just today, but tomorrow.
TO LEARN MORE VISIT: www.INTERFACEFLORBLOG.COM
“THIS COMPANY MAkES DECISIONS AND COMMITMENTS BASED ON THE URGENCY
OF AN ISSUE—NOT ON HOw EASY wE THINk A GOAL wILL BE TO ACHIEvE. AND wE’RE
CONFIDENT wE CAN MATCH OUR ABILITIES TO OUR vISION.”
—Peter GreeneVICE PRESIDENT OF MARKETING, INTERFACEFLOR
“THE ELEPHANT, BOTH POwERFUL AND vULNERABLE, IS A POIGNANT METAPHOR FOR ALL NATURE. ITS REMARkABLE COLLECTIvE MEMORY REMINDS US OF HOw MUCH wE HAvE FORGOTTEN AND HAvE DISCONNECTED OURSELvES FROM OUR ORIGINS.”
—Andries BothaSCULPTOR AND FOUNDER, THE HUMAN ELEPHANT FOUNDATION
wHAT’S THE PLAN?
GETTING OFF OIL wON’T HAPPEN OvERNIGHT. BUT IT wILL HAPPEN. HERE ARE THE FIvE BIG STEPS INTERFACEFLOR HAS TAkEN SO FAR IN GOING OIL FREE:
we admire them because they are like us. No animal is more “human” emotionally than an elephant. They live a life span like ours; mature at a similar rate; live in families, and forge friendships that last years. They play, laugh, care for their young, and weep when death takes their loved ones. They have instincts, deep and mysterious, that guide their survival. Their memories, of course, are legend. They are sacred in some cultures and a wonder in all. And besides, they are beautiful. The most famous elephants in history: Airavata, the spotless white “ele
phant of the clouds” who carries the H
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Should the commercial and industrial worlds concede that oil is a permanent fixture in their products or processes? InterfaceFLOR thinks not. Even better, the company has a plan. Peter Greene, the company’s new vice President of marketing, shares the details. FOLIO: Since 1994, InterfaceFLOR and its parent company, Interface, Inc. have inspired not just its own industry, but the manufacturing world, to look for ways to break the cycle of take-make-waste systems.
PG: Yes. That’s now part of our DNA.
FOLIO: But even for a company like yours, making a com-mitment to get off oil completely is a tremendous thing. Much larger than an elephant.
PG: This company makes decisions and commitments based on the urgency of an issue—not on how easy we think a goal will be to achieve. And we’re confident we can match our abilities to our vision. That said, once you acknowledge the elephant in the room, the question becomes, “How are you going to get him out?”
FOLIO: Let’s talk about that oil/elephant for a minute. Tell us more about where and how oil is used today.
PG: Oil is the one material, the one resource, that’s in almost everything around us. Not just the obvious, like fuel and heating. But everyday things like permanent-press clothes, stuffed animals, freezer bags, credit cards, telephones, and lipstick.
FOLIO: Stuffed animals?
PG: It’s everywhere. If oil isn’t an actual component of a product, it’s used in the form of energy during the manufacturing process. And carpet tile is no exception.
FOLIO: For a company on a mission to eliminate its negative impact on the environment by 2020, working with oil in its core product can’t feel right.
PG: You’re right. That’s why we want to be off oil by 2020. off oil is really a pragmatic, tangible aspect of our Mission Zero® commitment you spoke of. “Off Oil” is extremely relevant
today from every perspective: sustainability, geopolitics, and environmental concerns.
FOLIO: As you said, sustainability is part of the Interface DNA. It is built in, so to speak, to every product line. But is there one particular product line we could refer to as your most
“Off Oil” carpet?
PG: Actually there is. we incorporate everything we’ve learned into the products to various degrees. But the Convert™ design platform combines the big three: Post-consumer content fiber; GlasBac®RE backing; and TacTiles®, our glue-free installa-tion system. All that, and you won’t believe how gorgeous the color is.
FOLIO: I’ve seen it. I believe you. I have to ask you about the elephant you are bringing to Chicago this year.
PG: Nomkhubulwane. By the South African sculptor Andries Botha. Her name means “Mother Earth” in Zulu. She’s made entirely of recycled truck tires, by the way.
FOLIO: You pronounce her name beautifully. You’re a linguist, aren’t you? And speak several languages?
PG: Yes. But not Zulu. Andries chose the elephant as a metaphor to represent all that we, as human beings, have forgotten about our connection to the earth and our responsibility to it. This is so close to our feelings, and to the feelings of our founder, Ray Anderson, that we felt it an honor to sponsor Nomkhubulwane’s visit to Chicago.
FOLIO: For NeoCon?
PG: Not just for NeoCon, no. She’s actually staying almost a month. Doing some work on the IIT Campus first, then she’ll move to the Merchandise Mart during NeoCon. Afterward, Mother Earth will spend a little while at the Field Museum trumpeting an exhibit they are having on mastodons.
FOLIO: will Nomkhubulwane have her own Facebook page?
PG: She already does. She’s a big star.
FOLIO CHATS UP: PETER GREENE
PHOTOGRAPH BY ANDREw ZUCKERMAN
46%THE VIRGIN MATERIAL
wE’VE REDUCEDFROM OUR PRODUCTS
SINCE 1995
44%HOw MUCH OF OUR
OVERALL TOTAL ENERGY COMES FROM RENEwABLE SOURCES
13YEARS THAT wE’VEBEEN TURNING OLD
CARPET BACKING INTO NEw BACKING
16YEARS SINCE wE
STARTED ON THE ROAD TO
SUSTAINABILITY
15%THE AMOUNT BY
wHICH wE’VE REDUCED FIBER IN OUR CARPET
SINCE 1995
16%THE POST-CONSUMER
FIBER CONTENT IN OUR MOST “OFF OIL”
CARPET TILE
10YEARS LEFT TO GET
“OFF OIL” COMPLETELY AND ACHIEVE
MISSION ZERO
wHEN IT COMES TO SUSTAINABILITY, OIL IS THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM. IT MAY BE THE ONE RESOURCE THAT EvERYBODY USES, BUT IT’S ALSO THE ONE SUBJECT THAT MOST COMPANIES DANCE AROUND wHEN IT COMES TO MAkING THE wORLD A GREENER PLACE.
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ELEPHANT?wHATELEPHANT?
18
BABY’S GOT BACKSTORY
“This is the brand that inspires designers,” says Mike Toth, Founder and CEO at Toth in Cambridge, MA. “They consis-tently provide new insight and creative inspiration in every aspect of modular carpet — from its manufacturing and design to its marketing.”
Creative Director Robert valentine is no stranger to work-ing with InterfaceFLOR and its challenges. He and the com-pany’s CD, Russ Ramage, met and worked together for the first time under a project of similar scope almost 15 years ago and have worked together ever since.
This time, however, valentine was newly at work at Toth with his long-time friend and collaborator, Mike Toth. In short, Robert valentine + Team Toth = force of nature. For a client like InterfaceFLOR, that was as good as it gets.
And this campaign—which ultimately included four major print ads, a magazine, augmented reality, social media, a short film, video vignettes, themed shopping bags, and micro-sites—is also as good as it gets.
Not just because of the work itself, or the fact that the cam-paign is an integrated one. Such things have happened before in advertising. And not just because it is based on sound strategy for its multiple audiences.
This campaign is remarkable for two reasons: It is a first in the commercial carpet industry. And the product was the catalyst for all of it.
Here’s how it all came down.
PRODUCT AS PROVOCATEUR
The 2010 InterfaceFLOR® Memphis-inspired product lines tease the eye and push boundaries just as the movement that inspired them did. Further, they were created by a company that has also pushed boundaries and turned its world, the world of manufacturing carpet, upside down.
So in other words, safe, soft, traditional solutions could just keep on walking. As InterfaceFLOR’s Peter Greene put it, “The Memphis Movement was about exploring and breaking the rules, so we challenged Toth to do the same thing. That’s one of the things that led them to add augmented reality to the plan. An-other was that patterns within one of the product lines (the Mem-phis to Milan and Back™ Pattern Library) closely resembled the markers used as entry devices into the few AR experiences being tried commercially today.”
“we added digital media to traditional advertising early on because of the products,” says Robert valentine. “we used different mediums not just because they were fun—but because the very playfulness of those mediums was relevant to the product and to reaching certain new audiences.”
TRIPPING IT THROUGH THE 80S
Blondie. Pink Floyd. Madonna. Air Supply. Lipps, Inc. Olivia Newton-John. The Pet Shop Boys. whatever else the 1980s might have been about, it was all rock and roll to Billy Joel.
Because the Memphis Movement was born in the 1980s and steeped in its history, Team Toth started their work research-ing the decade and creating a library of imagery and candidate ideas that could connect with the products as well as work hard on multiple levels to connect with audiences.
Much of that imagery would be multi-purposed across each medium of the campaign: FOLIO™, the magazine Interface-FLOR launched in 2008 specifically to talk with its customers in a less formal, but more detailed way about its products and is-sues; the advertising campaign; and the augmented reality work.
Like the Memphis Movement itself, which made a point of pushing boundaries in the combination of colors, shapes, and even materials, each medium of the product launch would set that as its creative standard.
PHOTOGRAPH BY GEOF KERN
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LIGHTSCAMERAS
ANDAUGMENTED
REALITYACTION! IT ISN’T OFTEN THAT A NEw PRODUCT INTRODUCTION COMBINES THE MYRIAD OF ELEMENTS AND MEDIUMS AND DIGITAL MEDIAS AND HISTORIES AND ILLUSIONS THAT THE LAUNCH OF INTERFACEFLOR’S NEw MEMPHIS-INSPIRED PRODUCTS HAS DONE. IN FACT, IT HAS NEvER HAPPENED IN THE CARPET INDUSTRY BEFORE. BUT THEN, INTERFACEFLOR IS A COMPANY ACCUSTOMED TO SETTING INDUSTRY STANDARDS, NOT FOLLOwING THEM.
“DON’T GIVE THEM wHAT THEY ExPECT. GIVE THEM SOMETHING THEY NEVER THOUGHT POSSIBLE.” — ORSON wELLES
MEANwHILE, BACK AT THE RANCH.
with the advertising solidly in production, and the technology side of the augmented reality underway, FOLIO came into focus. FOLIO played a role no other element in the campaign could: Education. The more fully audiences understood the Memphis Movement and its relevance, the more richly they could appreciate the new collection and incorporate it into their lives. “Hearing David Oakey talk about the impact of Memphis over time and the freedom it gave designers to create a more personal sense of style brought it home,” says valentine. “Then the question was, what to dial up and what to dial down? Since this was Memphis, I think we dialed almost everything up.” For Designer Jack whitman, working on FOLIO was the heart of the whole campaign. “FOLIO ties everything together,” says whitman. “It tells the big picture, it gives the story behind the story, and it gives the advertising richer context.”
SHOwTIME AT THE SHOwROOM
NeoCon, 2010. The Showroom is where all of the preparation and the products come together in the industry’s biggest show of the year. Some companies have a formal style (products marching in orderly lines), but InterfaceFLOR prefers to build a total branding experience around their prod-ucts. “we’ve taken a different approach,” says Russ Ramage. “we’ve brought all the wit and whimsy of the Memphis experi-ence right into the showroom.” Sets from the “white Room” and “Playground” heighten the sense of theatre. visitors can play on the real sets and then visit the real showstopper—the multi-dimensional world of Memphis-inspired Augmented Reality. Hosted AR stations will allow visitors to use one of the ‘From Memphis’ carpet tiles to enter the AR world realized on oversized television screens nearby. Customers will also be treated to the company’s first “Behind the Scenes” film on the creation of the campaign. And of course, everywhere you look, the new lines will be underfoot. Memphis inspired, but InterfaceFLOR through and through.
PUBLISHERSINTERFACEFLOR
Peter Greene Vice President / Marketing
Russ RamageCreative Director
Rhonda Mitchell Director / Marketing
TEAM TOTH
Mike TothChief Creative Officer
Robert valentineExecutive Creative Director
Jack whitman Designer
Dianna EdwardsWriter
Bob FouhyAccount Director
Mark Sullivan Interactive Project Manager
Danny CalidicottProject Manager
Stephanie Cotherman Assistant Project Manager
Danny PellegriniPiggyback Films
Yvonne BarrigaShoot Producer
Anne kefferArt Buyer
Bobby ForgioneProduction Assistant
Marpi MarcinowskiFlash Developer
Andrew kolesnikovLead Developer
ken Michaels3-D Modeler
Doug Bowker 3-D Modeler
PHOTOGRAPHY
Geof kern Photographer
Debra Allen kern Set Stylist/Director
Renai Taylor Set Stylist Assistant
Michael Allen, Todd klein and Henry Piedra
Set Construction
Michael Thomas Hair and Make Up
Phillip Groves Wardrobe
Erica Felicella, Austin Lochheed Photography Assistants
Chris Stoll, Mary Brandt Imaginary Lines
PRINTING
Earth Enterprises 315 west 36th Street
Second Floor East New York, NY 10018
PAPER
Mohawk Fine Papers465 Saratoga Street
Cohoes, NY 12047
FOLIO is a carbon-neutral publication printed with no VOC, no solvent, 40-60 per-cent vegetable inks by Earth Enterprises, which runs its plant off renewable energy. FOLIO is printed on paper from Mohawk, one of the first large-scale production facilities in America to use wind-generated electricity. Isn’t fine print educational?
INTERFACEFLOR, LLC1503 Orchard Hill Road
LaGrange, GA 302401.800.336.0225, Ext. 6511
www.interfaceflor.com
INTERFACEFLOR CANADAwww.interfaceflor.ca
INTERFACEFLOR LATIN AMERICAwww.interfaceflor.com.br
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TH
E E
ND
CHARMED REALITY CHECK
ITS ALL GEEK TO ME
For any non-techie to describe what it took to turn the “Ode to Joy” fantasy playground into augmented reality would be sheer folly. There is still the child in all of us that wants to be amazed by three dimensions, four dimensions, floating and moving objects. Better that some things remain mysteries. For Mark Sullivan, Interactive Project Manager, shepherding Toth’s digi-tal group to wrap the technology around the business strategy was intensely exciting. Sullivan lives in two worlds at once: strategic and engineering. “Once we determined we wanted to do augmented reality from a business point of view,” says Sullivan, “the challenge was engineering the technology to do exactly what we wanted to do.” That’s where Developers Marpi Marcinowski and Andrew kolesnikov took over. The two men loved the complex task of creating the world of InterfaceFLOR in AR. “Developing the technol-ogy was the most diffi-cult aspect,” says Marpi.
“Then using it to pres-ent the product in three dimensions came next.” [Use the marker on the inside front cover to expe-rience the augmented reality we’ve been talk-ing about.]SHOOTING STARS IN TExAS
Before the AR team could work their magic, photographer Geof kern had to work his. kern has worked for decades with both Russ Ramage and Robert valentine. kern was the perfect choice for this assignment because he’s an intellectual with deep references and amazing conceptual skills. In this case, the look and style of the photographs was very much a collaborative effort, says kern.
“I received specific direction from Robert and then visualized what the sets should look like. Then I worked on sketches and drew up the plans.” Take the “white Room” ad for example. That wall is composed of re-purposed items, painted white, to symbolize the modularity and sustainability of the client. There’s a cubbyhole built into the wall that’s strong enough to support a human being. To bring the plans to life, Debra Allen kern collaborated with valentine on almost every detail, finessing color palettes, props, background paintings—you name it. Once approved, Ms. kern’s master builders built the sets with extreme attention to detail. A good thing, since two of those sets are making the trip to Chicago for NeoCon. while kern was shooting the advertising, another photographer was working on set at the same time, for a different reason. Danny Pellegrini of Toth’s Piggyback Films shot behind the scenes for a video that will also debut at NeoCon—another industry first. Says Pellegrini, “I was shooting for the film, the vignettes, and maybe a little AR. All the pieces work together to tell a larger story.”
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