Chicago, IL, April 25, 2007--Trend spotters had a field day—four field days, in fact—at Coverings 2007, the premier international ceramic tile and stone show held at Chicago’s McCormick Place from April 17 to April 20. Those in search of high style found the mother lode on an exhibition floor filled with fashion-forward examples of the latest design and technological innovations from around the world. As trend guru Maxine Laurer of Sphere Trending noted in her Wednesday morning lecture, “Tile Trends: On the Edge and Ahead of the Curve,” this is an age of abundance and of high-end luxury, and today’s design-savvy, globe-trotting, digitally linked consumers want to enjoy every aspect of every experience—in personalized environments filled with products customized to their individual specifications.
Many of today’s most stylish tiles seem straight off the runways of Paris, Milan, and New York: metallic surfaces, particularly liquid-like gold, silver and platinum, are everywhere. So, too, are the eternally chic faux looks: faux marbre, faux bois, and faux skins, among others, are omnipresent, and often finished with a chic metallic sheen. Menswear seems here to stay, with linen looks, pinstripes, and herringbones dressing an array of new products. Yet the feminine mystique remains, with arabesque patterns, lace-inspired tracery, and flowers, flowers, flowers flooding the show floor. Organic themes abound, too, as do graphics, super graphics, and geometrics, particularly circles and dots. Texture, too, triumphs as a top trend—and in a wide variety of scales. Tiles today are awash in color, in a palette of bold brights and cheery hues that expands well beyond the traditional spectrum of the rainbow. Moreover, in this technologically transformed society where continuous change is the only constant, the desire for the tactile, the handmade, and the artful continues to resurface.
Trends being trends, overlap happens. Designers, like consumers, revel in the mix. Circular motifs, for example, may be limned in gold or silver leaf; texture and color may converge; exotic woods and linen looks may take on glimmering glazes; and so on. But art, as always, abounds.
April 2007