Bold new furniture collections grab your attention

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LAS VEGAS — Everyone knows the house always wins, especially during the Las Vegas Furniture Market. This past winter, more manufacturers used the venue to launch new products than ever before, with manufacturers going all in when it came to Earth-friendly products.

Lexington Home Brands debuted several collections, including 11 South, a contemporary line with a distinctly urban feel, as well as Beach House, a collection of easy-living pieces for the already popular Tommy Bahama line of coastal-inspired furnishings.

Famous for easy, tool-free assembly, Legare Furniture went from practical to fanciful. Its showroom featured whimsical room displays and frog, surfboard and Volkswagen Beetle-style beds. Great for children's rooms, the line is made of eco-friendly materials.

Jaipur Home is an India-based company that promotes its sustainability efforts. Tables, chairs and serving pieces are handcrafted from responsibly harvested Sheesham wood by the artisans of Rajasthan, India.

“It is one of the best woods out of India and comes from the foothills of the Himalayas,” said Nitin Soni, whose grandfather started the company. “This wood has a high natural-oil content, so it is great in any climate.”

Mango and Acai woods tend to split because they do not contain as much natural oil. The Sheesham grain is particularly striking. Jaipur Home also does The Good Earth collection, which is furniture crafted from reclaimed wood, some of it centuries old.

“We salvage the old railroad ties and wood from buildings being torn down to make unique pieces of furniture,” Soni said. The company sells to Target, Sam's Club, Walmart, Pier One Imports and others.

Global Views introduced Studio A, a new company with an affinity for repurposing materials others overlook. Its Sidney Collection is a line of furniture and mirrors made from discarded bamboo growth knots.

“There is a company in Guatemala that builds homes using bamboo poles in place of lumber as the basic support structure. The knots are cut off, and we have them glued to panels and made into furniture,” said Studio A co-founder Mary Wilson, who started the company with her husband and their partner, Will Foster.

Bamboo is naturally mildew- and termite-resistant and fast-growing, which makes it a green material. Another interesting fact about the bamboo is that it is harvested only once a month during the descending quarter moon.

“The company that builds the homes is run mostly by women and is supported by an investment group, which is a great thing for women in a developing country,” Wilson said. The women explained to her that the bamboo, which has a high water content, is driest at that time and easiest to cut and process.

“We always had a vision of a very eclectic, design-driven line and we look for sourced objects and artifacts that are unique,” she said. “Everything we do, we want you to feel the craftsmanship of the product.”

Although they started the company as the economy was tanking, they managed to stay afloat and approached Global Views about a partnership. The rest is history.

“Our look adds a well-traveled, organic style to their colorful, shiny line,” Wilson said. Studio A also showed mirrors and accessory furniture made from tin patch — old tin cans used in India. Another source for Studio A is a group of widowed Guatemalan women who make very large, decorative sisal rings.

“What we've done is feed them a more contemporary idea on their craft,” she said.

Hand-carved slingshot handles, also from Guatemala, were new at the Vegas Furniture Market.

“They are sourced artifacts from the Mayan highlands. When a young man learns to hunt, his first weapon is a slingshot, which he carves himself. It's like a coming-of-age thing,” she said.

They are intricately done pieces of things that are significant to them. They can depict animals, Mayan gods, birds — whatever has meaning to the carver. “There are even some of soldiers with a AK-47s,” Wilson said.

The Texas-based Four Hands Furniture Co. introduced its Sierra Collection. It's a line of contemporary, rustic furniture for the dining room, family room and bedroom inspired by the snow-capped Sierra mountain range. Each piece is handcrafted from discarded and reclaimed wood. It also introduced the all-aluminum Boston Dining Table.

Going for the rainbow instead of the pot of gold was Pol Art, with a collection of classic-style furniture by Pol Rey International Furnishings. Doing both the reinforced steel frame coated in resin and the upholstery in the same eye-popping colors gave the staid Victorian and French reproductions a fresh, youthful appeal. Royal blue, lemon yellow, lime green, chocolate, vanilla, white, black and purple are some of the finishes available. Chandeliers and sconces come in the same variety of colors.

All of what was introduced at the Las Vegas Furniture Market earlier this year will be available in stores by late spring or early summer.