Kairo

The Domotex in Hanover showed the full reach of what flooring can do today, ranging from stylishly designed carpet tiles and waterproof laminates through to impressive carpet artworks.

The exhibition “Full House: Design by Stefan Diez” is still being assembled at MAKK. But what is already clear is that what will go on display in Cologne will be far more than a simple show of his work. We talked in advance with Stefan Diez about his concept.

A carpet like a piece of desert, Astroturf for the children’s room, and any amount of color for carpets: What Piero Lissoni and Vanessa Brady noticed when wandering round the Domotex.

Do furniture design and fashion swing to the same rhythm? We had a look round in Cologne, London, Milan, New York, Paris and Stockholm: And started with color.

The right floor covering can appreciably enhance a building’s quality. We present five good examples: A high school in Ergolding, a PR agency in Toronto, a residence for art lovers in Turnhout, Belgium, a maternity ward in Essen and an art forum complete with bar installation in Düsseldorf.

Square one-size-fits-all carpet tiles are very yesterday – the hottest trend in floor coverings are jigsaw carpets. The result of a collaboration between Vorwerk and Berlin designer Werner Aisslinger, “Elementary Shapes” enable us to piece together personalized carpet creations from six basic geometric shapes.

Imm cologne attract creative minds from all over the world – this time they included Marc Bailly, interior architect straight from New York. He joined Robert Volhard, Stylepark MD, for a tour of the Cologne interiors fair to find out all about innovative design this side of the Great Pond.

He’s not really interested in skylights. But in the third part of our tour of the “BAU” trade fair in Munich, Amandus Sattler discovers that there are in fact some well-executed specimens out there, such as those developed in collaboration with Foster+Partners. He also finds out that you can’t tar all drainage systems with the same brush either, that no two types of paint are the same, and that “green PVC” is really quite an attractive option.

As the “world’s leading trade fair for architecture, materials, systems” BAU in Munich offers a wealth of information for architects, planners and anyone with an interest in today’s building solutions, or tomorrow’s. That said, this time round highly customizable standard solutions took center stage while true innovation remained scarce.

We could not blame you for already being excited about what’s to come at the next domotex from January 12 through 15, 2013. Organizers Deutsche Messe have already caused a sensation with a preview. The leading trade fair for flooring has managed to get none other than designer Stefan Diez on board to create a setting that is attractive for exhibitors and visitors alike.

Data protection patterns, and columns of numbers and letters without their content spelling a meaning, form the basis of "Rapport", an intervention by architect Jürgen Mayer H. at Berlinische Galerie. Outsized the symbols spread across the floor and walls to form an "experimental spatial structure".

For a long time architects preferred wooden and stone flooring. Industrial carpeting by the meter had a bad reputation. Often without any justification. Vorwerk's "Selected Rugs" boast unusual materials and textures, thick-pile fleeces and cool mixtures of wool and linen.