July 9, 2018

WHA’s Carla Turk Summarizes Five Trends From NeoCon 2018

Guest post by WHA’s Carla Turk, Interior Designer

3 days, 5 floors and 1 cup of coffee. No, this is not The Amazing Race. This is NeoCon.

NeoCon is an exciting time for us Chicago designers as we weave through floors 3-11 at theMART. New product lines, revamped showroom designs and familiar faces drive me to see the show every year. There’s so much to learn from our friends at the showrooms, but with 5 full floors, 3 hours (including travel time), and 1 bar left on my phone, I took in as much as possible about this year’s design trends.

Here are my 5 takeaways from Neocon 2018:

1. To Seam Or Not To Seam? That Is The Question.

Carpet tiles have given us a plethora of options in shape, size, installation and several shades of grey. Now we have a new factor to play with: flooring transitions. Here’s an example from Shaw carpet tile called “Inside Shapes.” It offers a variety of shapes and colors to be used in different combinations or to create a demarcation of activity zones within your open office space. Mannington “Spin” offers continuous movement through its texture, pattern and color blends.

Shaw
Mannington

2. There’s No Place Like Home.

Imagine this: Sofas and lounge pieces in soft neutral blends, dotted with jewel toned upholstered pieces. Sofas are accessorized with soft broken-in pillows in colorful patterns and soft textures. This furniture setup is screened with peek-a-boo wood dividers to allow for light and visual boundary. We complete this look with a decorative pendant and table lamp fixtures, enveloped with a generous amount of plants. That’s right Toto, this is not Kansas anymore. This is the modern workplace.

ICF / Nienkamper
Stylex

3. The Nature Effect.

Manufacturers continue to offer nature-inspired materials in response to trends, including biophilic design. Biophilia suggests that we’re naturally drawn to nature, which promotes overall well-being. As an example, materials that represent wood, like Virgina Tile’s “Convergence,” captures the look of an end grain wood and is cast in a polished glass mosaic. Other odes to nature included the Solar Study carpet collection from JJ Invision and Shaw’s new LVT that also looks like a wood end grain. As we all know, amenity spaces with outdoor features have grown too. Davis had new outdoor furnishings as part of their offerings at Neocon.

Virginia Tile
Knoll

4. I Am Big And Need Big Walls To Fill.

Large scale patterns like undulating waves caught my attention at Knoll’s showroom, along with the larger-than-life lady bugs and flowers that adorned their walls. Carnegie had a nice large-scale wallcovering installed at their showroom that looks like a watercolor brushstroke. Large scale also pertains to pieces that encourage group activities like Halcon’s large adjustable height tables and Knoll’s communal bar height table.

Knoll
Carnegie

5. I Am Small But Mighty.

There are fine details that got me excited during my tour, including the leather detail on Datesweiser’s conference table, pop up outlets at a round table from Geiger that almost disappear in the closed position, and corner transitions and thin frame details from Muraflex.

Datesweiser
Geiger