Rowe Fine Furniture Provides Eco-Friendly Furniture for Museum Eco-Exhibition in NYC

Furniture World Magazine

Rowe Fine Furniture announced that it has provided eco-friendly, smaller-scaled upholstered furniture to include in the exhibition Growing and Greening New York: PlaNYC and the Future of the City organized and on display at the Museum of the City of New York. The exhibition continues until April 12, 2009. Organized in terms of a typical day in the life of a New Yorker, the exhibition explores six essential areas addressed by the Bloomberg Administration’s ambitious five-borough plan for sustainability by 2030: water; transportation; energy; open space; land; and climate change. The exhibition features architectural models, furniture, interactive displays, diagrams, renderings, photographs, hands-on examples of new materials, videos, and more, many of which have been created expressly for the exhibition. Growing and Greening New York opened with a gala reception on December 15th with Mayor Bloomberg in attendance and remains open to the public until April 12, 2009. The Museum of the City of New York is located at 1220 Fifth Avenue. Among nearly one hundred products and services lent to the exhibition are three pieces of Rowe upholstered furniture which are all eco-friendly as well as smaller-scaled, the latter being an additional consideration for individuals living in an urban environment as well as smaller footprint advocates. Rowe’s collection of smaller-scaled furniture has been a hit since it was introduced at the High Point Furniture Market in October 2003. Rowe has been manufacturing furniture in the United States since 1946 and is also a Founding Member of the Sustainable Furnishings Council. “We’re honored to be included in such a relevant and landmark exhibit,” explained Stefanie J. Lucas, President & CEO of Rowe Fine Furniture. “Rowe is committed to manufacturing environmentally-friendly furniture and to responsible manufacturing practices. We take a leadership role as a U.S. manufacturer committed to sustainability and we plan to be around to benefit from a cleaner environment.” Growing and Greening New York considers issues, problems, and challenges facing New York while also documenting solutions proposed by architects, urban planners, scientists, industrial designers, engineers, as well as by non-profit organizations, advocacy groups, and other entities involved in the process. The exhibition takes the visitor through the course of a day—7 a.m. through 2 a.m.—and links routine activities with information documenting their collective impact on the environment, while also offering alternatives for making these actions less harmful to our world and highlighting innovations that will lead to greater sustainability by 2030. The 8 p.m. hour (in the context of the exhibition) returns the visitor to the home, where individual choices such as how to furnish a home, what type of lighting to use, and which appliances to buy are linked to such global issues as solid waste, water quality, and climate change. In this section of the exhibit, the visitor encounters three pieces of Rowe furniture. Each piece embodies eco-elements in the construction as well as being upholstered in an eco-friendly, natural fiber fabric. The eco-friendly materials and processes used in the manufacturing of Rowe Furniture include: · Arm cardboard: 100% recycled paperboard ·Corrugated cardboard: greater than 25% made from recycled corrugated containers ·Down cushions: filler made from recycled plastic bottles and ticking material is no longer bleached ·Springs: made from recycled iron ore ·Nails/Screws: Uncoated. Instead, water-based lubricant is used. ·Foam: greater than 20% of the Polyol chemicals come from plant-based renewable, raw materials. In addition, the foam making process is free of ABAs, CFCs and auxiliary CO2 ·Foam Fire Retardant Materials contain organic, halogen free, and PBDE free materials ·Wood from replenished and domestic forests ·Cotton: 97% recycled materials ·Wovens/Non-Wovens: Some bleaching process eliminated Rowe’s manufacturing facility in Elliston, Virginia we have instituted a number of initiatives and engaged the entire workforce in thinking about ways to further advance our eco-friendly approach to manufacturing. Details include: ·The heating system for the wood frame factory, and fuel for the wood-drying kilns, is generated by burning scrap wood and sawdust. ·We have considerably reduced our methanol emissions (HAP’s and VOC’s) by switching from duplicating fluid used in making our fabric cutting patterns to using plotters and recycled paper ·We switched from a solids-based foam glue to a 2-part water-based foam glue to further reduce HAP’s and VOC’s ·We reduced emissions (HAP’s and VOC’s) from our wood-finishing operations by changing from a 5-7 step process to a 4-step process ·We encourage the reading of emails and not the printing of emails, and we have introduced fax-to-email ·We switch off computers overnight ·We use natural ingredient based cleaning solutions for floors, windows, etc. All of these initiatives illustrate Rowe’s intention to produce eco-friendly furniture with responsible manufacturing practices. Growing and Greening New York: PlaNYC and the Future of the City is generously funded by the Rockefeller Foundation. Additional support comes from Con Edison, James G. Dinan and Elizabeth R. Miller, the Mertz Gilmore Foundation, Allison Whipple Rockefeller, the Brenner Family Foundation, Surdna Foundation, The Durst Organization, Nixon Peabody LLP, Tishman Speyer, Martin J. McLaughlin, Hamilton F. Kean, Metro Fuel Oil Corporation, Josie Merck and Jim Stevenson, Mark M. Iger, Tap Into the City, and Richard W. von Bargen, Jr. The exhibition co-chairs, James G. Dinan, Hamilton F. Kean, Martin J. McLaughlin, and Allison Whipple Rockefeller, provided invaluable leadership. The exhibition is organized by Guest Curator Maura Lout, a longtime public policy expert and a former Charles H. Revson Fellow at Columbia University. The exhibition is designed by Pure + Applied. The Museum of the City of New York celebrates and interprets the city, educating the public about its distinctive character, especially its heritage of diversity, opportunity, and perpetual transformation. Founded in 1923 as a private, non-profit corporation, the Museum connects the past, present, and future of New York City. It serves the people of New York and visitors from around the world through exhibitions, school and public programs, publications, and collections. The Museum’s exhibitions and public programs on infrastructure, architecture, and other aspects of urban development—Robert Moses and the Modern City: Remaking the Metropolis, among others—have garnered praise from the press and public alike. For more information please visit the Museum’s website at www.mcny.org