Each year, the region’s best design firms and design schools team up with industry manufacturers and battle it out on the runway in front of a packed room at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center for the annual IIDA New England Fashion Show.
The designs are developed based on a show theme and are created exclusively from the tools of their trade – interior finishes, furnishings, light fixtures and more.
With the theme of “Ritual”, we created the honeybee waggle dance, or #WaggleDance, earning “Best Interpretation of Theme” for the second year in a row!
Partnering with Knoll Inc. (Knoll, Knoll Textiles, Knoll Studio, Spinneybeck, Filzfelt, Datesweiser), Office Resources and Forbo Flooring, our entry was made of: upholstery fabric, laser cut wallcovering, wood veneer, laminate, linoleum, nylon (colored and virgin), paper from Knoll price list books and discarded architectural drawings, mesh back chair samples, felt, belting leather, structural furniture panel supports and screens, polycarbonate samples, drapery, 3D printed elements, paint, CNC routed wallcovering and, finally, wire.
Watch the #WaggleDance come to life!
The 2025 OpenLAB Boston studio work will be exhibited at Virginia Tech Monday, March 2nd through Wednesday, March 4th.
Please join us for the following events on Monday, March 2nd:
11:00am - Lecture with Parke MacDowell
1:00pm Lobby talk with Kevin Sullivan
This year’s studio identifies seven sites along the frayed edges of Boston’s Greenway. The Greenway is a one-mile-long linear park running through the heart of the city, reconnecting downtown Boston with its waterfront. Many of the parcels along its edges remain undeveloped and present mute, blank facades to the public realm. Addressing and repairing these edges through acts of infilling, layering, grafting, framing, and placemaking is the core focus of the studio—SUTURE.