In January, two of our product designers, Gary and Laura, headed to Germany for the highly regarded international furniture and interiors fair, IMM Cologne.
This four-day exhibition showcased innovations from frontals, colours, and accessories, to storage, worksurfaces and layouts, and most importantly reaffirmed our predictions on the latest and most popular trends to hit the industry this year.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be taking you through those featured and how you can apply them to your business, through existing or new product, maximising the design potential and capitalising on leading developments within the KBB industry.
First up, frontals and colours!
Frontals
Unsurprisingly, slab doors dominated the exhibition, with the true handleless style being a particular beneficiary of this door design.
Lacquered doors also remained strong, with matt finishes proving popular over gloss, as well as, cut and edged MFC showcasing a lower cost alternative with flexible sizing.
Textured
“From concrete effect and timber veneers to metallic or marbled finishes, textures accounted for over 50% of frontals on display at IMM Cologne”
Gary Short, Product Designer
Carrying on from the ever-popular industrial influence that has engulfed the trade and consumer press, textured frontals are a great way to add a strikingly visual aesthetic to a contemporary design.
How to achieve this look:
Whether your client wants to embrace the full trend throughout the kitchen, or simply limit it to an island or wall run, our Alpina range utilises real timber veneers with gloss, matt or heavily embossed finishes as well as made-to-measure sizes, to ensure they are completely adaptable to your design.
Products featured:
Doors
Top left: Alpina Silver Oak Matt with Porter & Graphite Handleless Trim.
Top right: Porter in Matt Graphite with Alpina Smoked Oak Matt.
Bottom: Porter in Matt White with feature island in Alpina Burnt Ash.
Worksurfaces
Top left: Strata Timber Black Washed & Neolith Ultra Compact Beton.
Top right: Strata Granite Black Linen.
Bottom: Strata Quartz Brilliant White, Strata Granite Sinuous White
& Strata Granite Nero Assoluto.
Offering a similar look and feel, but at a lower cost point for your customer, our Unity range features twenty, edged slab doors in a range of finishes including soft-touch supermatt, metallics or woodgrain, with a choice of two edged options in some colours and the additional flexibility of angled doors.
Products featured:
Door: Unity Cashmere Gloss & Lava Gloss with Aluminium Handleless rail
Worksurfaces: Dekton Ultra Compact Halo & Strata Timber Prime Oak
Further finishes:
Glazed
“We saw a good, strong presence of glazed frontals at IMM Cologne, mainly on wall unit applications.
Full height glazed doors were also prominent on open-plan displays; helping to soften the kitchen aesthetic and bridge kitchen / dining and living areas.”
Laura Vaillant, Junior Product Designer.
From Fluted, Patterned or Tinted Glass, to chrome or stainless-steel Metal Frames, Glazed frontals work perfectly in an open-plan environment, to accentuate the contemporary, industrial styling within the design.
How to achieve this look:
Perfectly suited to contemporary kitchen design, our feature glazed doors are ideal to personalise your client’s design. In a choice of two colours, black or bronze, they can truly create a striking statement.
Products featured:
Doors
Top left: Fitzroy in Copse Green with Bespoke Glazed Door
Top right: Lichfield Espresso with Bronze Featured Glazed Door.
Bottom: Porter Matt White with Black Featured Glazed Door.
Worksurfaces
Top left: Strata Quartz Calacatta Gold
Top right: Neolith Ultra Compact Strata Argentum.
Bottom: Strata Quartz Brilliant White, Strata Granite Sinuous White.
We’ve also just introduced ten brand-new feature glazed doors to our Mornington Range.
Gary Short, Product Designer
Colours
“IMM (finally) signaled a shift in focus from the heavily dominant grey palette and reaffirmed the swing towards dark /navy Blue-tones. Black also shone as an emerging colour for the immediate future, used predominantly in a matt finish; working well on its own but paring well with accented textures, timber finishes or accent colours such as muted greens.”
Gary Short, Product Designer
How to achieve this look:
This year, we’ve not only introduced two new colours, Carbon and Regiment, to our ever-growing palette, but we’ve also taken one of our most popular blue hues and added it to our stock colour line-up – meaning you’re even more equipped to service your customers with trend-leading shades!
Don’t forget, you can view the ranges in person at our two state-of-the-art design centres
Contact your PWS representative to book an appointment.
So, have you seen an increase in any of the above trend requests coming from your consumers? Or have you been inspired to introduce these into your client’s design? We’d love to see the end result – share your real kitchens with us over on our PWS social media pages.
Next week, accessories, storage and lighting!