Blend: Expressions

Expressions: F i n d i n g Yo u r F i t Fabric as a Brand connector

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Fresh Produce

Looking through Different Eyes

Being Groove-y

Elevating your Visual Communication

The Star of Bars

Raising the Experience with Fabric

The Dr Pepper StarBar story

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Get into the

Groove

Expressions Thoughts from the fabric guru

Fabu Fi

In this issue 325 Fresh roduce

Welcome to What’s New spotlights

For those new to world of design, architecture, and fabric as seen through my team’s eyes - I say WELCOME. As a troublemaker, collaborator, guru, and opinionated big-mouth I am afforded an interesting opportunity as truth seeker to float around the world seeing, experimenting with, and speaking about design a bit differently than most. I don’t include myself in any type of creative category so it frees me of the shackles of traditional design roles. As a seeker of the unorthodox I was afforded the privilege this year of walking among the world’s best in technology, design, and retail by attending a variety of exhibitions and seminars at Euroshop, Globalshop, Exhibitor, and the Design Management Institute.

As designers, you are always challenged by your directors, clients, and other folks who THINK they understand the design process to LOOK at your projects “WITH A DIFFERENT SET of EYES”. What if you were to look at your designs through the sense of touch rather than sight? Imagine the heightened focus your communication could have if your participants experienced design through true interaction instead of only simple visual connectivity. I challenge you to reach beyond the lazy action of observing things through those ocular sockets you call eyeballs. Instead, look through touch.

Earlier this year I journeyed to Euroshop in Dusseldorf, Germany, and challenged myself to just touch, not see or hear, what was happening on the showfloor. But I found myself challenged by my attempt and enamored with the details of brand expression and the tools used to communicate on a variety of different planes.

Adjacent to my opening thoughts are some of the things I found profoundly cool from the viewpoint of material choice, application, and detail. I encourage you to hone your senses; take a moment to enjoy the details, envision your applications and solutions through the catalyst of touch, and challenge the visual status quo by producing environments and applications that require interaction. This interaction should enlist the power of touch. After all, it is the first sense we develop when we enter this world. It should NOT be set aside because we have grown older or lazier. Be well, design samurai. Create the unexpected. Produce the memorable. Bring life to your vision.

Notes from the editor:

Fabu Fi

Looking through touch in the wonderful world of interaction

In December of 2010, Fabric Images, Inc.速 moved into new corporate digs in Elgin, Illinois. The company used the relocation as an opportunity to heavily incorporate the very product they sell into the architecture: printed fabric tension structures. FI marked its expansion by creating a tactile work environment that serves to both inspire and educate. Besides the obvious increased logistics and fabrication capacity, Fabric Images wanted to create a space that people would love to live in.

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d e t a c o l re built s ip h s r e n t r a at p to a house th

The expansion of the headquarters included a 200,000-square-foot addition that will house research, engineering, logistics, and the latest in print, welding, and sewing technologies for fabricating both small and large printed tensioned fabric architecture.

They built a house that could grow to meet the ever-changing demands of the industries they serve. Folks say bigger isn’t better, and in many cases it isn’t. However, this new facility is in part about the growth of an industry, but it really is about providing a venue capable of containing the passion for what they do on a daily basis.

“The expansion of our Elgin plant is part of our overall re-branding and operational repositioning,” said Gordon Hill, VicePresident of Fabric Images, Inc. “By expanding our facility and production here, we have realized operational efficiencies that will lower our cost structure, shorten our production-to-delivery cycle, and enhance our long-term competitiveness. The additional manufacturing facility is equipped with new state-of-the-art equipment including 16-foot-wide dye-sublimation printers that will produce a full range of new offerings for our clients in exhibitions, events, museums, retail and architecture.”

In addition to logistics and meeting the growing demands of the customer, FI also wanted to create a very open, inviting, team-focused environment. Tasked with designing the 200,000-square-foot facility, Hill stripped back the space and looked for innovative ways to foster efficiency and communication. His findings included creating different zones—work zones, interactive zones for brainstorming sessions, relaxation zones, and customer zones—to foster efficient, nurturing cooperation and collaboration. “We’re taking textiles and working them into the architecture of the space,” said Hill.

He further explained that upholstery fabric offers aesthetic and acoustic benefits to “modesty panels” in designating various departments. “Chenille lends a tactile, warm feeling to higher walls. Canopies made from mesh (to avoid blocking the sprinkler system) mark interactive areas and lend intimacy to work areas under 14to 16-foot ceilings,” said Hill.

“The beauty of fabric is that it’s extremely lightweight,” said Marco Alvarez, President and CEO of Fabric Images. “It adds texture and slightly different dimensions than what a rigid substrate can offer. And from an acoustic perspective, it becomes functional as well as aesthetic.”

Each space within the work areas is dressed with specific applications to bring life to the overall concept of working with textiles on a daily basis. That concept spills over to interchangeable “touch walls” that allow customers (as well as employees) to experience firsthand the different types of textiles Fabric Images offers. Such use of fabrics throughout the facility reinforces the corporate culture.

“Our intention with this space is to use it as a case study, to show people all the options they have using textiles,” Alvarez said. “Our target audience is architects, exhibit builders/designers, interior designers, and office furniture companies that design spaces for their customers. From an aesthetic perspective, you can change an environment from year to year, month to month, or week to week with fabrics.”

An additional design criterion for the space was the development of an environment that communicated the personality of the Fabric Images brand culture, which is flexible, open, passionate, human, and warm. This is demonstrated in the iconic lobby structure which immediately impacts visitors upon their entrance into the building. A 17 x 20-foot wall draped in red polyester draws attention to the building, and is visible even from the street. Next to this is an image of one of FI’s projects on a 10 x 20-foot wall. However, the real “experience” begins as people walk through and are “wowed” by the space created with an unorthodox building material fabric and aluminum frame that utilizes the Groove™ Lite extrusion.

Design flexibility allows the space to morph into whatever experience Fabric Images wishes to communicate. The overall space and individual areas are highly functional and adaptable.

Everything is a stone’s throw away from being communicated among the day-to-day resources and people of Fabric Images. With this facility move, FI has both increased awareness of fabric architecture and elevated its own brand position, bringing it one step closer to becoming the most sought-after producer of printed and non-printed tensioned fabric architecture in the world.

Brilliance S P E C I A LT Y S E R I E S

Traditionally this material has been used for semitransparent backdrops or detail pieces, but highlighting the material ‘s traits with theatrical lighting elements brings out the wilder side of its seductive personality.

The Brilliance material offers a lightweight, translucent effect in a number of dramatic hues.

The material has a clever luster that plays with any environment by adding extra depth and mystery to your showcase. Similar in construction and weight to a Voile textile, Brilliance can also be used in applications like gathered curtains, decorative swags, and banners.

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When the artful combination of textiles collides with the beauty of messaging, the result brings a memorable connection between the Brand and its audience in a visual and tactile experience. This connection is chameleon-like in nature, allowing the viewer to participate on an entirely different realm of communication while being hidden in plain site, interweaving within the visual language being communicated.

Designing Responsive Interactions Series:

Enter the Fusion

of Messaging & Materials

“Anyone who cares about meaning as well as form should be interested in visual language as a powerful medium of nonverbal communication�

-Peter Bonnici

London 1998, Visual Language, the Hidden Medium of Communication

As a designer of brand environments you are tasked with the goal of fusing the “old economy” mindset with “new economy” paradigm shifts. One of the most important shifts of the new economic business model is creating lasting intimate customer connections or relationships with a preemptive marketplace position. Most marketers would suggest that the challenge to this is ramping up fast. However, experiential design isn’t about how “fast” but about how to “last”. Making a lasting impression that extends past the initial contact to make a highly memorable experience is far more important than speed to market. This raises the debate of whether marketing/sales ideology and programs should trump the visual artful design of a brand’s personality and language.

The super-brands understand this need for a consistent visual language. Brands that are not making a finite effort to maintain and embrace their language and essence on all levels will be ending with a similar fate of the dinosaur. As Peter Bonnici suggested about a brand’s language, “All communication takes place through language, but not all languages involve words.” This is a key reason why fabric is a perfect bridge in the realm of brand environments. It is not just a visual communicator; it can elicit memories that drive far deeper than words on a canvas or advertisement.

For a good example of impacting a customer’s experience with this dynamic, look to the luxury auto industry. This marketplace has defied the expectations and strategies of a downturned economy. It was assumed the current recession would impact all markets, but such is not the case for luxury automobiles. While there was a dip in overall sales, the annual outcomes remain solid, profitable, and bright. Many see the world of luxury vehicles as too often limited to style. Rather, it is shaped through reputation. Manufacturers like BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Infiniti are recognized for their high standards and endless demands — they require perfection on every level, including the consumer’s purchasing and driving experience.

These manufacturers ensure that all features exceed expectations. This includes the “feel” of the overall interaction. This high level of experience allows them to succeed in future connections with consumers because they have created a strong brand fusion of memory, expectation, and delivery on their individual brand promises.

All of this starts from the message. Having a clear, effective message that delivers on a brand’s promise can be achieved on a variety of levels. We want to highlight one in particular - a Brand’s FEEL as it relates to experiential interactions.

Choose Wisely, “Grasshopper”

As I’ve said before, touch is as powerful as, if not more than, the sense of sight. It might be the visuals that draw them in, but it is the interactions that keep them drinking from the well. Choosing interactive materials is paramount to establishing these successful influences. From flooring to counters to graphics and displays, the materials, finishes, and shapes you choose send visual cues to the shopper conveying mood, attitude, and brand image. Today’s designer has a host of material accents available to them. The important thing to keep in mind is that careful and considered selection of these design elements will result in an integrated experience or environment that supports a brand’s image.

Fabric’s popularity as a design element to support the effectiveness of these environments is on the rise, thanks to its lightweight attributes, personalityspecific textiles, and advances in fabric printing technology like 10- and 16-foot Superwide dye sublimation. Fabric can be used for signage, to divide a space, or to create bold dimensional pieces that catch the eye. It is ideal for creating large lightweight shapes and displays. Elgin-based Fabric Images, Inc. creates shapes by stretching fabric around a framework. An example of their work are the large lighted fabric exclamation point-shaped columns used as window dressing accents in a Times Square LaCrosse store.

[touch is as powerful as, if not more than, the sense of sight. It might be the visuals that draw them in, but it is the interactions that keep them drinking from the well.]

The use of fabric elements in signage is nothing new in temporary applications, and while in the past hanging fabric required sewing special rod pockets or similar hanging strategies, the Fabric images, Inc. product line has evolved to include a fabric holder called Groove™ Lite™. This system has eliminated the need for pockets, and prevents the pulls and puckers sometimes associated with hanging fabric graphics. The materials available for fabric architecture are evolving, as are their applications and solutions they showcase. Check it out www.fabricimages.com.

Shifting the Experience

The experienced design community often selfidentifies as being digitally focused, but I have found the opposite to be true. Design for the artificial is drastically behind the eight ball in creating a truly experiential interaction. Before any designer can develop a memorable engagement with a target audience, either by a product or environment, they have a responsibility to integrate the audience with an involvement period. This involvement will ensure the audience buys in to the experience presented to them. Engagement of the audience is essential when audience is unfamiliar with the brand’s product, message, or offerings, and touch points are a necessary tool to influence the change in behavior.

We need to remember that every single person interacting with a 3D or 2D experiential space is stimulating their sense of touch. They are typing on a keyboard or clicking a mouse or shaking hands as an introduction or pushing buttons or... something that requires an action and not a passive observation. Touch is a part of our everyday experience. Why shouldn’t something that is hard wired into our DNA be aspired to with every experience for which we are designing?

Secondly, we need to get our heads (not to mention our tailends) out from behind our artificial interfaces.

Designing an experience is holistic. It is not limited to pictures or sounds or pixels or hardware. We need to assert ourselves into the environments of the people interacting with our experiences. We should strive to plug into what we are asking others to interact with. The interaction does not need to end

with the digital interface or point of purchase or lead gathering, even if it is centered in those areas. It should create a memorable bond that can inspire the target audience to embrace the essence of what the Brand or its experience is communicating. For Pete’s sake, create something that is dipped in reality, not fakery or artificiality! You can’t get more real than textile integration to create a touchpoint.

A Concluding Point

I am not talking about going to the moon. It is just a matter of opening your minds a little bit and looking with a different set of eyes at the definitions and boundaries that hinder creating wonderful, touching interactions. After that, the only limitations are imposed by our creativity. Technological and financial barriers are factors, but not roadblocks. The benefits of creating better experiences are virtually limitless.

Before you start designing an experiential space, ask yourself something: What am I most passionate about or moved by? Most often, the answers lie in areas not currently being addressed within design solutions.

However, they are well within our individual grasp to produce. The world is yours to design, not in or out of the box, but by blasting out of the envelopes in which you have previously stuck yourself. So is there any real reason to wait to express a fresh tactile interaction, or do excuses just come naturally to you?

“Design for the artificial is drastically behind the eight ball in creating a truly experiential interaction.”

Groove™ AD

Express Yourself If exhibits are supposed to be about the visual representation of a brand’s personality, then the question that should be answered in a brand experience is simple: Does the architecture itself reflect the brand, or do the materials used to dress the architecture reflect the brand? I would argue the latter. Why? Look at it this way: Most fashion models are tall, skinny, and, for the most part, look great dressed or not. But do they look better “dressed up” by a fashion icon or by a hack with a pair of scissors and a hot glue gun?

Doesn’t your brand deserve the same level of “dressing” and detail?

Textiles scream personality, and the details of each unique textile heighten a brand’s appeal. Don’t trap your company’’s growth potential by using cheap , sloppy, or dated materials that reflect an old, out-of-touch brand.

The exhibit was comprised of a variety of items that included:

27 different printable textiles 2 non-printable interactive textiles Candy green powder coated exposed metal Gloss blue & white powder coated exposed metal Hand bent freeform metal water holder Freeform bent sculptural butterflies & accessories 6 organically-shaped custom partitions 5 single point rigged canopies 1 curved, port holed meeting area

The solution itself was comprised of several pieces that interacted with the attendee and the overall environment. Poly-dimensional architectural pieces offered the attendee a low-tech sensory exploration without high-tech additional costs.

Each application created the ability to extend the user-experience by involving the human senses of sight and touch. The space extended a variety of opportunities that include customized printing and messaging, layering for dimensional effect, versatility in lighting, creating and dressing organic architecture and manufacturing a unique atmosphere through tensioned fabric solutions.

Express yourself.

What is your essence?

Getting into the Groove

of what is hot and what is not can feel like searching

for the Holy Grail. Influenced by the economic downturn, rising logistics and transportation costs, and a quest for keeping the consumer interested in a Brand’s environment, more and more designers are opting for simple, meaningful architecture to combat the growing roadblocks.

The Groove™ fabric SEG display system is a versatile graphic messaging system that utilizes dye-sublimated printed fabric with silicone membrane to attach your visuals of choice via an aluminum extrusion. The silicone membrane solution inserts into the extrusion around the perimeter of the frame to create a taught, wrinkle-free display with finished edges that fit smoothly into place. Because no tools are required to exchange the fabric graphics, it is an ideal product that grants you the freedom to change your messaging, artwork, or design easily as you change your mind.

This display extrusion system is perfect for use indoors or outdoors at home, exhibits, and events, or in retail stores, churches, museums, and corporate lobbies. This smart frame-and-lock system provides quick assembly and easy graphics change-out, and reduces costs and damage. By splitting big formats into smaller profiles you can maximize your images and ability to update your look or graphic message.

The Groove™ Difference There are several key points of difference relating to wall display fixtures and frame options. What makes the Groove™ a unique solution from traditional hard panel prints is its storage and shipping. Fabric graphics are light and easily folded, taking up less space than traditional graphic prints. Care is also easier when you choose the Groove™ frame and fabric. The material can be washed or steamed without adverse effect to the overall color or vibrancy of the print .

Another benefit is no visible sew line. The sew line is hidden within the Groove™ extrusion, providing a clean and neat finish to the wall treatment.

Additionally, the dye-sublimation process produces no glare on your print when used on if you are utilizing the standard Celtic SuperWide fabric. This feature allows the Groove™ to serve as a backdrop for photography or videography.

Finally, the Groove™ wall display system is ecofriendly. The system is compact and lightweight for added transportation and storage benefits and cost reduction. There is even a growing movement towards recycled materials that can be used in the SEG extrusion marketplace.

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The beauty of the Groove™ is its ingenious design and ability to accept other types of textiles, both printed and non-printed. The profile was developed to achieve a very distinct look that focuses on the messaging or effect rather than a bulky aluminum framework. Designers can now use a very simple, understated aesthetic to make their communication the focal point when using this SEG extrusion system.

The Groove™ in Application There are lots of examples and ideas to highlight the application of the Groove™ SEG Display system in use, but one big box retailer is pushing the boundaries of the extrusion to its maximum potential. The in-house design team, in partnership with Fabric Images, Inc., is utilizing the benefits of the Groove™ to create unique, fresh environments throughout the store’s departments for the next-gen consumer.

Another of the benefits as they relate to the fabric graphic prints and the frame is no visible sew line.

The sew line is hidden within the Groove™ extrusion providing a clean and neat finish to the wall treatment.

Another point to make is the dye sublimation process produce no glare on your print if you are utilizing the standard Celtic SuperWide fabric. This feature allows the Groove™ to serve as a backdrop for photography or videography.

Finally, some of the last benefits are the green or eco-friendly aspects of the Groove™ wall display system. The system is compact and lightweight for added transportation and storage benefits and cost reduction. There is even a growing movement towards recycled materials that can be used in the SEG extrusion marketplace.

Building a Star Experience

Dr Pepper elevates the Dallas Stadium environment

“The Dr Pepper StarBar was created to extend the artistic vision of the new Cowboys Stadium, and we can’t wait for fans to enjoy all it has to offer.”

- Shaun Nichols, creative director for Dr Pepper Snapple Group

Totally Bright Details Set beneath 15 aluminum arches that light up in celebration every time the Cowsboys score, the Dr Pepper StarBar offers fans multiple gridiron-geared amenities and an exceptional view of the Dallas skyline. The 17,000-square-foot platform houses a complete bar featuring backlit vintage Dr Pepper bottles cast into a concrete bar top, along with acrylic “ice-cube� lounges.

In late 2009 HKS Brandspace tasked Exhibitgroup/Giltspur and Fabric Images with the fabrication and installation of a one-of-a-kind hospitality venue in time for the debut of the new Cowboys Stadium near Dallas. The Dr Pepper StarBar is one of the most recent examples of an increasing trend in experiential design using printed tensioned fabric architecture. The stadium, which is being referred to by many in the media as the 8th wonder of the architectural world, is home to a variety of experiential spaces for Dallas Cowboys fans, including the StarBar. The 17,000-square-foot bar and lounge area is located on the upper concourse at the east end of the stadium. The StarBar cements the latest trend in architectural design and construction materials that include printed tensioned fabric structures as part of an overall solution. Designed by HKS Brandspace and HillebrandCorey, this fabric architectural structure creates a unique opportunity for fans of the Dallas Cowboys to enjoy the game by incorporating the latest technology fused with high-class details.

One of the key overall design and construction components was the use of printed tensioned fabric architecture to create the arches and several large components of the StarBar. To ensure the fabric architecture of the Dr Pepper StarBar exceeded expectations, Fabric Images, Inc., an expert in the field of tensioned fabric architecture, was added to the fabrication team to ensure a timely and proper installation of the fabric components serving as the backdrop and focal point of the lounge experience. The Elgin, Illinois-based Fabric Images, Inc. was selected because they have successfully engineered and fabricated a wide range of large-scale printed tensioned fabric architecture. The unprecedented architectural design was constructed as one of six separate party experiences accessible to fans of the Dallas Cowboys during games.

The StarBar cements the latest trend in architectural design and construction materials that include printed tensioned fabric structures as part of an overall solution.

Collaboration Seeing the puzzle of design, products, and solutions through different eyes.

Fresh Produce Series

With “the need for speed” in today’s business landscape, staying viable and competitive in a quicksand-like business environment requires reaching out to new avenues of untapped creativity for fresh ideas. In our ever-accelerating world, the process from idea spark to market-ready product has evolved. What used to take four to six months to develop and deliver is now produced in half that time, if not sooner. For this compressed timeline to be successful, an “all hands on deck” approach is essential, as well as more efficient delegation and management of the design process.

This shift to urgency can be facilitated by collaborative design. Using fresh talent from unconventional sources can stimulate and invigorate your creative operation, and concurrently expand your business offerings.

What used to take four to six months to develop and deliver is now produced in half that time, if not sooner.

Furniture designer Bill Stumpf said, “The sources of invention and new design knowledge are not in the design cookbooks and menus, but out in the vegetable patch.”1 At the heart of every collaboration-and design in general--are folks who explore, play with, learn from, and respond to a myriad of inspiration. At Fabric Images, Inc., the formula for success is found in such a “vegetable patch.”

What they have honed while working with various partners is a successful formula of visualization and communication. First visualizing a brand’s essence, and then communicating that essence through an experience of fabric architecture and innovative textile-based materials.

Today’s marketplace, however, has demanded an additional response in conjunction with their mainstream business avenues: product development. Until recently, Fabric Images, Inc. has singularly maintained a manufacturing role. But like others in this industry have discovered, it isn’t enough to just produce. Initiating product creation is now the standard practice.

“The sources of invention and new design knowledge are not in the design cookbooks...”

1. Bill Stumpf, “A Serious Chair: Observations and Intentions,” Design Quarterly 126, 1984, p. 35.

Recognizing the advantages of collaboration in design innovation, Fabric Images, Inc. pushed its future-forward pursuits by forging a cooperative relationship with Pratt Institute in New York City. In 2009 FI developed a concept to serve as a studio design class at the esteemed school. Their ambition for this studio was to inspire the creation of design marketready solutions focused on temporary, mobile fabric architecture that would be both innovative and impactful on its environment.

By blending FI’s technical expertise and designengineering with the ideas of the next generation of urban designers, the company was able to explore new possibilities in material function while preserving the intent of a design and the practical application in which it would be used. The goal was to strip away preconceptions of what fabric does, and realize what fabric CAN do.

In the Fabric Images-sponsored T.E.N.T. Studio (which stands for Tensile Ephemeral Nomadic Terrain), fourth-year undergraduate architecture students were challenged to design fabric shelters which addressed social and spatial features of urban life. Catastrophe relief solutions, worship and meditation spaces, and urban garden structures were some of the potential categories of structures to be created.

But cutting-edge design was not the only requirement.

Sustainability, use of eco-friendly materials, easy deployability, and structural integrity were all paramount to this next wave of temporary dwellings.

A commitment to bringing to life structures that are both socially relevant and environmentally responsible remained at the core of the Fabric Images mission.

Seeking to foster interaction between a structure and its outdoor surroundings, the Rhizome Chair is the first installment of fabric-based furniture solutions scaled to fit within any individualized outdoor environment.

Cabana/Garden assumes an enclosure having openness to its environment, able to support, and designed around ideas of vegetation and water.

Collecting and diverting rainwater for the plant material, designing a type of small-scale sheltered garden, and providing for human rest/relaxation through sun shading are the requirements for this type of structure to be deployed on urban rooftops, suburban backyards, or in rural areas as cultivated shelter pavilions. One can be flexible and privilege the garden aspect versus the poolside luxury relaxation interpretation of this typology.

The Haiti Soft House is a prototype semi-permanent shelter designed to house displaced Haitian citizens following that country’s devastating earthquake. It debuted at the Haiti Soft House Project reception and fundraiser in 2010 in New York City. Designed both to withstand hurricanes and resist earthquake activity, as well as to provide a healthy, wellventilated environment, the Soft House was seen as a remedy to a landscape in crisis.

The Catastrophe shelter is to be thought of as emergency refuge in times of calamity and great need. The structure must completely shelter from the elements and provide for basic survival as a first line of defense.

In this program especially, shielding the body, its protection, layering, and tailoring architecture to the corporeal, will be imperative. Consideration should also be given to social ideas of displacement. Further, this structure can be designed to cluster with multiples of itself, and provide for group/community spaces outside of the structure itself.

Pearls of insight

“Think Collaboration” mmunities

“Collaborative co tinually apply their encourage people to con jects—and to unique talents to group pro collective mission, become motivated by a the intrinsic not just personal gain or creativity. By s ou om on pleasures of aut mon purpose to a marrying a sense of com se organizations supportive structure, the workers’ talents are mobilizing knowledge highly manageable and expertise in flexible, approach fosters group-work efforts. The agility but also not only innovation and efficiency and scalability.”

w

- Harvard Business Revie

kscher, Paul Adler, Charles Hec and Laurence Prusak

“Ultimately, brand is about caring about your business at every level and in every detail, from the big things like mission and vision, to your people, your customers, and every interaction anyone is ever going to have with you, no matter how small.”

- Harvard Business Review

Dan Pallotta

To adapt

“ landscape, w to the changing a shift from hat’s needed is to “activatin building brands simply projeg” them — from is to optimiz cting what a brand does in orde ing what a brand closer to tranr to move people Activation Imsaction. This is the perative.”

- Harvard Bus

iness Review

William Ros Laurence M en and insky

The railroads did not stop growing because the need for passenger and freight transportation declined. That grew. The railroads are in trouble today not because that need was filled by others (cars, trucks, airplanes, and even telephones) but because it was not filled by the railroads themselves.

They let others take customers away from them because they assumed themselves to be in the railroad business rather than in the transportation business. The reason they

defined their industry incorrectly

was that they were railroad oriented instead of transportation oriented; they were product oriented instead of customer oriented.

- Harvard Business Review Theodore Levitt

By exploring the possibilities of materials and technique, blending inclusiveness and balance in dynamic and impactful construction, FI strives to move beyond the methods of today, bringing the possibilities of future design to the present.

The early stages of this FI chapter required an exacting answer to a fundamental issue. Could FI progress from a custom-focused, one-off manufacturing style to a design-centric mass production facility? And could they cultivate the insight to develop consumer-desired, enriching products that are competitively priced and market ready? Through collaborative design they have done just that.

Fabric Images has unlocked the puzzle

look for more to come...

Croc

REACTIVE SERIES

material

Highlight

An embossed leathery crocodile texture is just the start to the dimension of this material. When heat is applied, Croc changes hue from a dark brown through the color spectrum to green, blue, and purple.

This material is best used at ground level and within reach of visitors to a retail or exhibit space. When placed in a location that is likely to be touched, columns, counters, and walls accented with this material will certainly draw attention. On its own the brown/black color and pattern of Croc makes a sophisticated, upscale statement. * *Minimum yardage is required call 847.488.9877 for more information and quantity requirements.

OnTap! The Art of the Frame:

A Freeform Spotlight

Metallic fabrics: the illusion is real

and much more...

Metal:

The under lying story