By Katelyn Nolan
Today more than ever we as a human collective are conscious of how the choices we make and the items we purchase affect our well being and the planet. From the food we eat, to the clothes we put on our bodies, to the products that we are bringing into our homes. As interior designers, we know all too well the importance of sourcing quality pieces for our clients that will stand the test of time but it’s also incredibly important to us that those pieces are made with the environment and our clients’ health in mind too. In our design business, we take the responsibility of sourcing quality super seriously and also relish in being able to interpret those nuanced details and differences to our clients. Many of the lines we go-to over and over again for quality are proudly represented in our to-the-trade showroom and we’re excited to share some specifics with you on the topic.
FURNISHINGS
Hickory Chair has been working for the last 100 years to create custom, made to order furniture - and it shows. Their casegoods are still being made the same as they were decades ago, using thoughtfully harvested and carefully milled wood. They are then sanded, shaped, and assembled in their workshop in North Carolina. Their collections and offerings have expanded drastically, but one thing remains the same they are committed to using responsible business practices. Hickory Chair is always working to find new ways to empower their clients and employees, and to continue efforts to minimize their long term impact on the environment. We love them so for all of these reasons and so many more - like customization possibilities galore.
Bonus! Hickory Chair collaborates with some of the world’s top designers like Suzanne Kasler, Ray Booth, and Susan Hable just to name a few. We’re admittedly partial to Hable Construction’s fresh and modern approach to furnishings and come back to her Hickory Chair line time and time again in our own projects. You can also source Hable Construction’s textiles directly from us.
Cisco Home has been a family-owned Los Angeles based furniture company for nearly 3 decades. Creating handcrafted pieces with a passion for elegant design while still being thoughtfully sustainable. They are founding partners of the Sustainable Furniture Council (SFC) and are dedicated to using only FSC certified wood and organic materials. While all of their materials are top notch, Cisco, the founder, took it one step further for clients that are seeking the most sustainable, healthy, and organic furniture on the market. His solution is called Inside Green and is an upgrade option for all Cisco Home pieces that uses FSC woods, organic latex, jute, hemp, wool, organic feathers, and down. Aside from being environmentally friendly, Cisco Home’s craftsmanship is top-notch, using only skilled makers who sand, screw, and stain each piece by hand from start to finish.
We can’t get enough of Cisco Home’s collaboration with John Derian, and coastal clients adore the casual, laid back look and feel of other pieces in the line!
HARDWARE
Sun Valley Bronze offers a stunning collection of solid bronze hardware that we can’t get enough of. The bronze used in their products contains a minimum of 85% of pre-consumer recycled bronze content. They use only the finest quality art-grade bronze for consistent, high-quality castings. New ingots are transformed into architectural hardware. Scrap bronze from sand castings is recycled into subsequent castings, and they even save the floor sweepings and send them to recycling centers! They also strive to make their facilities environmentally responsible by using green sand technology in the casting process, participating in both metal scrap and office material recycling programs, and ensuring healthy working conditions for their employees.
PAINT & SPECIALTY FINISHES
Sydney Harbour Paint Company offers the most unique finishes for interiors and exteriors that we’ve ever come across - in a word, we’re OBSESSED. You must check out their Copper Patina, stat! They are a leader in the market for offering a number of products that fall into the zero VOC paint category, making their paints 100% environmentally friendly. All of their paints are water-based, incorporating natural ingredients and limiting the use of harmful ingredients. Sydney Harbour continues to make the reduction of harmful VOC’s a core objective of their industry and is committed to research and development which has already achieved VOC reductions across the board. And if all of that wasn’t enough - everything in this line is Indoor/Outdoor and fade resistant for years. We’re still not sure why every designer in our industry isn’t using this line but until then it’s our little well-kept secret!
CLOTH & KIND QUALITY
Although we are not manufacturing product, we take Quality remarkably seriously here at CLOTH & KIND. When we built the showroom from the ground up in 2018, we intentionally compiled our internal systems and processes to address how we as experienced interior designers wanted to work with showrooms, and we intentionally shunned the old school model of how many showrooms currently operate. We made it our top priority to offer things like exceptional designer net pricing which allows you to retain more profit margin, to put an emphasis on best-in-class customer service, and to use technology to make things as seamless as possible for you (no filling out credit card forms here - all of your orders can currently be paid for online at your convenience any hour of night or day… and password protected online shopping for approved trade accounts is coming very soon!) all add up to a quality experience, as many designers working with us continue to tell us.
While we are the exclusive representation for the artisanal textile and wallcovering lines in our showroom, we realize that you may have a choice when it comes to sourcing and purchasing products from the lines listed in this post - and others like Visual Comfort. We welcome the opportunity to earn your business. Please let us know if we can assist you with sourcing, quotes or samples for your next project.
Here’s to top-notch quality!