Exclusive Interview with Heather Woods, Marketing Director of ICFF

May 28, 2017

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ICFF is the premier design platform in North American that celebrates the latest trends and achievements in contemporary design. The event offers a series of programs, exhibitions and features that will completely entice any visitor or design enthusiasts. The 29th edition took place from May 21-24 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Centre, in New York City. Coveted had the opportunity to interview the marketing director of the event, Heather Woods, and in this article, you will be able to discover a little bit more about the event, including exclusive photos.

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The main challenge of this year was the logistic aspects since it is one of the largest events in the whole wide world, there are a lot of international clients, thus a wide variety of different assortments take place. These obstacles are effortless surpassed due to the events nature of providing the very best solutions for industry professionals.

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ICFF has been established for 29 years and is now one of the largest design platforms in North America with a purpose of bringing together emerging designers as well as well-regarded professionals who have been in the industry for quite some time now. Through a curated selection of exhibitors, the event gathers around 35000 industry professionals in an open and traditional dialogue do discover new trends and achievements worldwide. In regards to upcoming designers, the show’s director and even the sales team supervise these designers, in order to make sure that everything is high-quality and original, providing the best outcome possible for ICFF and design, in general.

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“What’s so great about us, how I would define is we bring emerging designers, new people in the industry, as well as established designers and we, merge the two and what we do, therefore, we bring together 35000 industry professionals to learn new ways about things, traditional ways, new trends, what’s going on over in Europe, what’s going on in Paris, what’s going on in New York, what’s going on in California …” – Heather Woods

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One of the main attractions of this year’s edition was the ICFF gallery which has the purpose of being a complement to art and design, this is the first time the event has put this gallery into motion. The ICFF Studio was yet again a massive hit bringing together 12 emerging designers in partnership with Bernhardt Design, and seeing that they are rather fresh in the industry, this comes as the perfect opportunity to present their work. The event also selects sixteen schools where students put together their best prototypes and design their booths giving origin to mesmerising results, as a matter of fact, the University of Cincinnati won one of the Editor’s awards that are distributed at the event. ICFF is all about starting conversations and celebrating universal design, as Heather Woods explains, “we celebrate, of course, established designers and international designers, local designers, and upcoming designers.”

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ICFF is not just about furniture designs, it highlights other aspects, such as lighting, textiles, accessories and everything related to interior design. Initially, the event was only called International Contemporary Furniture Fair but has since evolved into a more versatile platform, merging the best elements of design.

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In regards to the future, the event will remain interior-related, keeping a close eye to new and innovative ideas as well as listening to what clients want, from architects to interior designers, to specifiers, basically to everyone involved in this wonderful commemoration of design. In accordance with Woods, next year’s edition will be quite special, “it is our 30th edition, but we are working on that right now, so you’ll probably have to stay tuned. It’s a surprise. So stay tuned.”

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