‘The Future Laboratory’ presents the trends for 2011/12

For a few days, the trends found a common, three-dimensional home in four pavilions. Caroline Till and Kate Franklin of ‘The Future Laboratory’ consumer insight and trend agency created this presentation and discussed not only the trends but also the setting for them.

A forest of ropes established the connection between the constructions that made a statement in accordance with the individual trends.

A building scaffold under naked light bulbs provided the stage on which ‘Utility’ was shown in terms of fabrics and colours.

The fabric samples, the rough simplicity of which represented the ‘Wilderness’, were located in a kind of primitive hut in the forest.

The construction for the ‘Mix Mash’ trend recalled the loud, colourful pieces of hand-made furniture by Rodrigo Almeida. The fabric samples standing for ‘Sobriety’ were to be found in a rectangular pavilion covered only with a light, translucent fabric.

Altogether, 1,636 fabric samples – all of which could not only be looked at but also touched – hung in the presentation. They were selected from almost 12,000 samples sent in by Heimtextil exhibitors – more than ever before.