Unique wall decor keeps category strong
By Cinde W. Ingram -- Home Accents Today, 9/1/2006
Unusual wall decor offerings are keeping sales steady in the category, which continues to benefit from high-end, large-scale pieces designed to fit today's larger homes.
"For us, sales are up (when compared) against last year," said Malanta Glassco-Knowles, vice president of marketing for Paragon Picture Gallery. "We're actually seeing it go more toward the higher-end product, and mirrors are very strong right now."
Other leading wall decor vendors also described sales as healthy or steady but noted changes they made to maintain growth.
"We chose our segment very carefully in a niche market of wall decor so our sales are up," said Sean McFadden, Interlude Home, vice president of sales. "We have really focused on the unique. We're not going to slug it out in traditional prints. There's a lot of price competition in the segment, but you really get rewarded for doing something different and special."
George Eouse, CEO, Art & Frame Direct, also mentioned the category's competitive nature. "We had to place wall decor on promotion this past summer show circuit in order to maintain levels at our factory so I would say sales are OK due to efforts made to maintain it," he said. "We've had to give dealers more reasons to stock more to keep sales up."
Because Holton Galleries opened early this year, President Richard Holt couldn't compare its sales to previous years but he drew on his 30 years of industry experience to describe the wall decor category. "Overall, it's still fairly strong," Holt said.
Mac Cooper, president and CEO of The Uttermost Co., described wall decor sales as showing steady growth but not at the rapid growth rate of the past few years.
"Alternative wall decor is where it seems the excitement and rapid growth is," Cooper said. "That is what creates the most excitement at market and in between markets, and it's where so much of our growth has been in the last year or two. The product is retailing and that's why the sales continue to be very strong and are still growing in the category."
Alternative wall decor includes 3-D art work, often with mixed materials like metal, rattan and leather. "Usually there's some art object or artifact featured, whether it be in shadowbox or within a metal sculpture," Cooper said. "Often it will incorporate some mirror, antique mirror or hand-painted art, but it's not the old-style mirror inside a four-sided frame or art with mats under glass.
"As far as trends, the one we continue to see in all products is more mixed materials and natural materials, for example leather with rattan and iron, or wood mixed with hammered metal," Cooper said. "The mixing of materials adds richness, depth and it feels more authentic. I think that trend will continue."
McFadden said Interlude Home's wall decor sales also reflect movement toward unusual pieces. "Customers are much more demanding of wall decor than they ever have been," he said. "They're getting more sophisticated. They want unusual, different, overscale, interesting textures and finishes. I think the days of the same-old, same-old print in a frame are long gone. That's become a commodity business. So you have to be different, original and somewhat bold."
In addition to unusual pieces, the trend toward bigger pieces to fit larger homes continues.
"Scale has helped and we cater to that higher-end look so that's a bigger market for us," Eouse said.
"The white space on the walls continues to grow so the traditional portrait on a wall just doesn't have enough impact anymore," McFadden said. "If you look at the mirrors that are successful, it's the big leaning mirrors and the oversize mirrors — and I think wall decor is the same concept. If you've got a large wall that's got high visibility at the entrance of a home, the designer/the homeowner wants something substantial there, something meaningful. That translates into they want something large."
The Uttermost Co.'s sales have leveled off for oversize mirrors, which for years were one of the fastest growing parts of wall decor. "It's still a significant part of the wall decor market, but we're not seeing growth in that direction like we once did — now it's more steady growth," Cooper said. "One thing that's attractive to us and to retailers is it's a big ticket item. It may not cost as much as a sofa, but it's pretty substantial. We do have more and more oversize pieces on the art side and that's a pretty strong part of the market."
Becky Minton, who works with Holt at Holton Galleries as executive vice president, product design, agreed larger scale is a continuing trend.
"You've got all these houses with high ceilings and you need larger product to fill it— even for wall decor in the bath area," Minton said. "People are decorating those bath suite areas better. It's part of the spa feel and the comfort of going home and unwinding so they're decorating those areas to their comfort level and spending more money on accessories."
Glassco-Knowles mentioned another result of consumers' seeking comfort. "I'm seeing a lot more traditional, New Traditional is what we're calling it," she said. "This is what typically happens when the economy slips a little bit. Everybody goes back to what's comfortable and traditional in subject matter.
"As for colors, it's still strong in the earth tones," she said. "I see a lot of browns and reds still. I think the golds are going to be much more popular this fall. Probably for us, yellow is not as strong as gold will be because of framing. We're doing higher-end molding, some European-type finishes and trying to stay away from a lot of Chinese import looks by going with higher-end products and components. It's still very clean; the mat's very clean-looking. And a lot of our customers like the textured images, where it looks like an original oil painting but it's really not."
Minton also described clean lines and simple treatments even in traditional subject matter. "As far as art goes, we're still seeing a lot of reds, black and also earth tones — the browns, darker greens and golds," she said. "Going more modern is a way to ease people into modern decor. You take subject matter they are familiar and comfortable with and modernize it, clean it up a little bit. I think simplicity is the keyword for everything I'm seeing from a design standpoint, casual also. It's not so ornate from the framing standpoint."
McFadden said, "We are seeing some resurgence in gold, which we have not seen for a while. Silver, and particularly the pewter range of the soft brushed silver, was king for a long time. We're starting to see some classic gold tones."
Holt also said while silver and pewter tones are most popular, gold is making a comeback. "And it's not a bright gold like it used to be, it's a burnished gold and has colors mixed with it. Even the darker wood tone frames have highlights of gold. We still have strong finishes in some of the traditional shapes, where it's really a pewter base but is rubbed with gold for an antique look."
Eouse said gold has remained a key aspect of wall decor. "It's 'old yellow' to the industry and I think it always will be," he said. "As far as looking for brighter, shinier gold, we don't see a lot of that. ... We have several takeoffs on the gold variation which have been very popular," he said. "We developed our tiger golds, which are done by hand-separating leaf over basecoats and burnishing to create a gold-inspired neutral finish. Interesting finishes in general, more on the wood tones, have been where our increased volume has come from. We're constantly looking at developing deeper, richer ways of executing tasteful, simpler looks."
Cooper said he expected to see the trend moving toward gold, but hasn't noticed it moving quickly. "But I agree, it's not bright gold, it's either an antique gold or more of a gold with a bronze cast," he said. "As far as matting or art treatments, we are seeing more hand-finishing around art that complements the art. And more depth, for example more raised matting or thick frames that function as shadowbox as opposed to double and triple matted framed art."
Malanta Glassco-Knowles
Mac Cooper
George Eouse
Sean McFadden
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