Join Our Mailing List / email

Your email:

Current Articles | RSS Feed RSS Feed

Upcycle: Sample Chip Table

  
  
  
  
  

We recently posted one of our most favorite “upcycled” DIY projects from Fresh Home that featured a headboard surfaced with colorful Formica® Brand Laminate samples. We figured a headboard this unique deserves an equally creative nightstand – so imagine our delight when we came across this table in CasaSugar that was created by Reason Furniture Design.  It’s surfaced with — you guessed it — our laminate chips.

We’d love to see a wall installation using our obsolete samples.  Any takers?

Cool Energy House Preview

  
  
  
  
  

We’re gearing up for the International Builders Show (IBS), February 8 – 11, in Orlando and hope to offset the heat by spending time in the Cool Energy House.

Sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Building America Program, the Cool Energy House is a performance-based, whole-house remodeling demonstration project that educates the industry and homeowners about economically sound measures and strategies that result in energy efficient, healthy, comfortable and durable homes.

Formica Corporation is committed to meeting our customers' evolving needs for sustainable products as well as reducing environmental impacts – which is why we are excited to sign on as a product sponsor of the Cool Energy House.

Formica® Brand Products are featured throughout the home, including Forest Stewardship Council (FSC®) certified Formica® Brand Laminate patterns in Neutral Weft (craft room cabinets), Fossil Weft (craft room island), Espresso Pear (garage kitchenette cabinets, garage bathroom cabinets)and Dry Erase Markerboard in Bright White (craft room message center. e Series Solid Surfacing by Formica Group, the first major branded solid surfacing material to contain post-consumer recycled content, also can be spotted in the house and includes e Fog (craft room countertop) and e Natural (garage kitchenette countertop, garage bathroom shower surround).  Both products also are GREENGUARD Indoor Air Quality Certified® by the GREENGUARD Environmental Institute under the GREENGUARD Standard for Low-Emitting Products, including the requirements for Children and Schools.

If you’d like a sneak peek at all of the products featured in the Cool Energy House before it welcomes attendees at IBS, check out last Wednesday’s KBTribeChat on Twitter (@kbtribechat / #kbtribechat), which has links to Cool Energy House product and lifestyle boards on Pinterest created by Mark Johnson, FAIA.

In addition, ForResidentialPros.com has been documenting progress on the Cool Energy House through articles and videos.  The site is a great resource for a holistic view of the project.

For those of you attending IBS, we invite you to stop by and say hello.  For those of you experiencing the show from afar, we’ll recap the project here on Share The Love.

2012 Sneak Peek

  
  
  
  
  
describe the image

We’ve blogged about the industry’s 2012 outlooks and color trends — now we’re “sharing the love” for some of the exciting things Formica Corporation has in store for the first half of this year.

Formica® Brand Products on the Road



If you’re in the area, be sure to stop by our booths at the following shows:

International Builders’ Show (IBS), Feb. 8-11, 2012 (Orlando)

Cincinnati Home and Garden Show, Feb. 25-26 & Feb. 29 - March 4, 2012 (Cincinnati)

Kitchen and Bath Industry Show (KBIS), April 27-29, 2012 (Chicago)

HD Expo, May 15-17, 2012 (Las Vegas)

New Patterns and Products



Formica Corporation will expand its best-selling 180fx® Collection with five new large-scale, sweeping granites and bold quartzites in lighter, more neutral tones.  Our latest additions will be introduced at IBS, along with an “edgy” unveiling of a new product.  Stay tuned to Share the Love, formica.com and our Facebook page for more details!

New Tech Tools

You’ll soon have Formica® Brand Product information right at your fingertips (even on the go) with our new kitchen and bath mobile app, set to launch in February.



Design professionals and homeowners also can use technology to visualize their three-dimensional kitchen and bath renovation using Google SketchUp.  This free tool will allow you to insert any and all Formica® Brand Products into your plans from Google’s 3D Warehouse.

New Partnership:  Save A Sample!



As we continue to grow our sample reuse program, we’re pleased to announce that Formica Corporation is the 2012 silver sponsor of Save A Sample!, a national reuse effort for the architecture and design community held April 3-5, 2012, in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.  If you are a design firm in a participating market and would like to donate unneeded samples, check out the Save A Sample! website for more information.

2012 promises to be a spectacular year as this iconic brand celebrates 99 years of surfacing excellence. Thanks for reading!

Upcycle: Sample Chip Headboard

  
  
  
  
  
Our sample reuse program continues to gain momentum with our recent Save a Sample! partnership and additions to our growing list on formica.com of organizations and artists who would appreciate donations of obsolete samples. From time to time, we will post our all-time favorite upcycling projects to provide a little inspiration on what you just might do with no-longer-loved samples.

Sharing Love For: Save A Sample!

  
  
  
  
  

As part of our efforts to keep obsolete solid surfacing and laminate samples from landfills, Formica Corporation is now a sponsor of Save A Sample!.

Save A Sample! is a national reuse effort for the architecture and design community to be held April 3-6, 2012, in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Washington D.C.  Save A Sample! collects unneeded brochures, samples and finish cards from leading firms and delivers the materials to local design schools.  As a result, talented students have a much richer set of resources to choose from during the year.  If your firm is based in a participating city and you'd like donate materials, click on the Save A Sample! link above to learn more.

Not based in a Save A Sample! pick up location?  Contact schools and arts organizations in your area to see if they might have an interest in your building material samples for creative projects.  We also provide a list of organizations that are interested in receiving samples on formica.com.

The Slow Home Movement

  
  
  
  
  
2 1 08slowhome1 300x200

There’s a movement gaining popularity within the home building industry that counters recent practices of quickly creating large standardized housing developments. Founded by John Brown, Matthew North and Carina van Olm in 2006, the Slow Home Movement (inspired by the slow food movement’s backlash against the prevalence of fast food) advocates a more thoughtful, “slower” approach to residential design that improves the quality of daily lives and reduces environmental impact.

Sharing Love For: Paper Samples

  
  
  
  
  

We’re always looking for ways to lessen our environmental impact, which is why we’re pioneering the use of paper samples in the building products industry.

It all started with 180fx®.  It was impossible to fit a pattern that spanned nearly five feet into a 2” x 3” sample chip.  To capture the pattern details, we enlarged samples for the 180fx® collection to 12” x 12”.  Large samples were more expensive to produce and mail; we knew this was not the ultimate solution but it filled a marketing need while we developed a better sampling approach.  Our eureka moment came from a brainstorm session ... what if we were able to color match the pattern and print it directly onto paper along with the actual finish?

Our marketing department worked with our printer to develop the concept and to ensure we could create an exact match.  Our collaboration resulted in a proprietary printing process that perfectly replicated the 180fx® patterns and finishes on environmentally friendly, FSC-certified recycled paper (10 percent post-consumer waste).  The paper samples were packaged as 13” x 19” tablets — consumers could simply tear off the 180fx® patterns they wished to evaluate and when finished, recycle them.

Since introducing the concept earlier this year, we’ve incorporated the 180fx® paper samples into point-of-purchase displays and related marketing materials, reducing the number of 12” x 12” samples in the field.  Paper samples provide more flexibility for our sales force and dealer partners and offer a more environmentally responsible option for viewing patterns.

The positive feedback we’ve received from the 180fx® paper samples encouraged us to apply paper sampling to other product lines, including the new e Series Solid Surfacing.  Just this week, we’ve added e Series paper samples that look and feel (thanks to soft-touch printing) just like the real thing to our wallboards.

Formica® Brand Products and LEED

  
  
  
  
  

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has produced the LEED® (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System, which quantifies the measures taken toward constructing a greener building. The LEED Rating System takes into consideration practices relevant to the natural environment such as the use of sustainable resources, conservation of non-sustainable resources and reduction of pollutants.

Share Love, Donate Samples

  
  
  
  
  
laminates
Share your love of laminate and solid surfacing by donating expired samples to one of many arts and education organizations that use building products in creative reuse projects.  We’re often amazed by the result — laminate chips are reborn as murals, sculptures, purses, notebooks, jewelry and more.

The greenest option is to donate locally.  The new formica.com sustainability page provides a list of community organizations that are interested in receiving samples.  It’s just a start and we hope to eventually have a representative organization in every state.  If you would like to add your organization to the list, please email formica@vehrcommunications.com.

If there is not an organization listed in your area, contact your local schools and community centers to see if they can put your samples to good use.

How Eco-Friendly is Laminate?

  
  
  
  
  
001 sustain img 300x131

The U.S. Green Building Council’s Green Home Guide recently posted a Q&A regarding the eco-friendliness of laminate countertops compared to quarried options such as granite and quartz.  According to Molly McCabe, AKBD, CGP, you should consider basing selection criteria on a product’s life cycle analysis (LCA).

All Posts