An impressive roadshow through Germany

Turning visions into reality, transcending boundaries and leaving your comfort zones: With the “Young. Younger. Forever Young” roadshow, OBJECT CARPET spent six weeks travelling through Germany. Wild, colourful, thought-provoking and “outside the mainstream”: The latest collection, FACTS & INSPIRATIONS, draws attention not only with its 22 new products, 88 styles and 1,214 colours, but also because it marks a generational shift in the design of broadloom and self-laying tiles.

“Constantly reinventing yourself means staying young. That’s why the Young – Younger – Forever Young project was particularly close to my heart,” Managing Director Daniel Butz explains enthusiastically. “Young. Younger. Forever Young” builds on the successful “Forever Young” roadshow from 2006, which was also undertaken in collaboration with AIT. Ambitious, hip firms with tremendous potential threw themselves into the work, developing emotionally resonant solutions that were both sustainable and forward-thinking, combining the new with the true and tested, giving concrete form to new visions. Experienced architects, such as Jan Störmer (Störmer, Murphy and Partners), Eike Becker (Eicke Becker_Architekten), Amandus Sattler (Allmann Sattler Wappner Architekten), Werner Sübai (HPP Architekten) and Hartmut A. Raiser (RaiserLopes Architekten) sponsored newcomers such as noa* network of architecture, Atelier ST, jack be nimble, Max Otto Zitzelsberger, SCOPE and Why the Friday, supporting them with advice and tips. “It was wonderful being able to experience how professional partnerships and private connections take shape,” Daniel Butz explains. “With the roadshow, we were able to establish a cross-generational network that has been unbelievably productive for everyone involved.”

The shows were correspondingly top of class. OBJECT CARPET is not only looking to create new textile innovations, but to establish creative spaces and lead the way in its industry by charting the course towards the future. People are looking for different things now when designing their spaces. Open office configurations demand floor coverings that allow for more flexibility: zones, which OBJECT CARPET calls “Shaping Spaces”. A rich selection of broadlooms, self-laying carpet tiles and custom-cut carpets (RUGX) can be combined in individualised ways, bringing a sense of play to a room’s design. The roadshow put this wealth of possibilities on impressive display. Viewers marvelled at how well-designed “Spaces” were created in public swimming pools, squares, streets, cities and other areas with the addition of OBJECT CARPET products, and they experienced, in person, how visions are transformed into reality. Intelligent, controversial and exceptionally lively – an exciting exchange between experienced architectures and ambitious up-and-comers full of their own visions and ideas.

Of course the architects and their designs were the roadshow’s main draws. But visitors’ enthusiasm showed that the new FACTS & INSPIRATIONS collection has real star potential. Health and sustainability played a key role in its development. That is why the stated goal for the FACTS & INSPIRATIONS collection was to develop healthy, safe floor coverings. We succeeded. All of our products are completely free of PVC, bitumen and latex. They have been awarded the German Federal Environmental Agency’s “Blue Angel” quality certification, they have been recommended for allergy sufferers by the TÜV, and they have received GuT certification.

“We think it is important to support networking across generations,” says Daniel Butz. “We can only innovate meaningfully in our field if we remain open-minded, evolve, and move ever onwards. For us, innovation requires cross-generational collaboration.” The same holds true for OBJECT CARPET: “My father and company founder Roland Butz handed leadership of the company over to Lars Engelke and me. The end result was the development, in conjunction with an absolutely amazing team, of the FACTS & INSPIRATIONS collection.”