New England Chapter

The Voice of New England's Furnishings & Design Industry

Addressing the wishes of our members, IFDA New England’s event strategy for 2011 is two fold.  A desire for members to network and a need to create opportunities to stay current with the latest style trends and technologies affecting the design community.  Following Chapter President Jacqui Becker’s lead and overseen by VP of Programming Diana James, the board has laid out a schedule of events through out the year addressing these two key concepts. 

Click on the Event titles to see pics

--Our most recent event in series was “A CAD RoundUp-What’s Right For You”.

Jorge Colon of LÓN Design & Greg Conyngham of ICS coved the latest CAD technologies, considering the designer’s special needs.  A Power Point overview of several programs included Sketch Up, ArchiCAD, Artlantis Render, Piranesi, Vectorworks, and 3D Studio Max among others. Topics included an explanation of the differences of rendering and modeling and the advantages to a designer of the uses of each. Jorge Colon made the point that clients of different age groups communicated differently and that designers need to be on the same wave length as their clients in how they present projects.  The event was hosted by 60nobscot Home Furnishings at their custom furniture showroom located in a restored 1820’s era barn. 

--Our March event  was hosted by Audio Video Designs, with additional sponsorship by Trufig

“Home Automation Technology Meets Great Design” was a panel discussion looking at the latest trends in Home Automation. Many issues were addressed as to how a designer can “keep up” with the advances of this fast moving technology.  Panelist Lucy Dearborn of Lucia Lighting made the point that if a designer overlooks discussing the latest automation technologies with a client there could be unpleasant consequences when their friends or neighbors complete a project incorporating these new automation features. 

--In Feburary came, "Teamwork- Archeticts, Builders & Designers: The Power of a wWinning Design Team"  an overview of how architects, builders and designers can work together to bring their clients a better product at a greater value than working separately. The panel consisted of an esteemed group of industry professionals moderated by Bruce Irving, former producer of “This Old House”. An interesting concept was proposed by architect Treff LeFleche suggesting that the team look upon clients as old world patrons and try to build that type of trust.  The event was hosted by Medallion Gallery, our newest Bronze Corporate Sponsor.

--New England’s first event of the year was “A Seminar on LED Lighting” at our Silver Corporate Sponsor, Wolfer’s Lighting. The extraordinary pace of change in lighting technology, and its effect on design, was beautifully illustrated and explained by Susan Arnold in their state of the art showroom.