Minding The Shoppers

Ms. Jean Wee examines the value of an engaging retail experience and maintaining a balanced mix of products and services as a way to counter the flagging consumer sentiments

- Marc Almagro

The Milan Furniture Fair ran for a week last April, but Ms. Jean Wee is visibly excited as she talks about some of the new pieces she saw. She goes over the details of the showstoppers as if she just walked past them yesterday. “One of the significant trends I noticed at the Salone was the application of contemporary Asian touches to furniture and furnishings,” she shares. “There was definitely a strong East-meets-West element going on.”

Several collections were in a range of Earth tones, with natural textures and materials, she continues. “I also noticed a selection of round dining tables,” she says, as if struck by an anomaly.

Although Ms. Wee, COO and Executive Director of Nobel Design Holdings, a major Singapore furniture retailer and contract design provider, is a veteran of international trade fairs, she has remained enthusiastic and susceptible to surprises all these years. She attends the fairs armed with a clear business agenda, but she doesn’t waste the opportunity to delight in the wonders of design.

“You should see the collection from Visionnaire this year,” she says excitedly. “It draws upon nature as one of its key elements. It uses bamboo in a very innovative way, along with an earthy palette and a touch of Asian motifs.”

“The Kathryn chair created for outdoor use by Italian designer Giuseppe ViganoÌ€ is a fantastic example of this; it has a seat shaped and upholstered like a giant pebble, and a curvy wooden frame and backrest interwoven with cords.”

This year, she adds, Minotti collaborated with Brazilian architect Marcio Kogan on a collection of outdoor furniture inspired by the Japanese Metabolic architecture of the 1950s. More of nature can be expected from the collection as Metabolist architects were known to infuse their design with ideas gleaned from biological processes.

SETTING UP SHOP