By Deena Bouknight
HIGH POINT, N.C.—Despite economic woes and consumer spending on home furnishings down at least 4.5%, the market here survives. In fact, this is a milestone year in that the market began a century ago. An unlikely location for what has become the largest home furnishings market in the world— with 76,000 attendees and millions of square feet of exhibit space—High Point originally rose as a market site because of readily available lumber and adequate railroad access.

With local big-name furniture producers such as Thomasville, Hickory and Lexington, the High Point market quickly became “the place” for national retailers to find quality goods to fill their stores. Gradually, suppliers of items for the home, including area rugs, realized High Point as a viable site for displaying new product.

While High Point is primarily a furniture market—as it has been since its inception— exhibitors note it helps in terms of offering an atmosphere of excitement while also showcasing the latest upcoming trends in home furnishings.

This year, a few furniture manufacturers focused on big names, such as Ty Pennington of Extreme Home Makeovers, food guru Paula Deen and, of course, Martha Stewart.

These star-power lines continued to impact area rugs as well. Safavieh, for example, has expanded its collection of Martha Stewart rugs. The new patterns include an array of styles: updated classic damask, abstracted naturals and lively geometrics.

“This new hand-tufted program brings exceptional value to consumers who want quality, style and greater affordability in decorative home products, especially desirable in the current economic environment,” said Arash Yaraghi, principal of Safavieh. “Together with Martha Stewart’s design team, we set new standards in the hand-tufted category by creating proprietary effects in combinations of viscose and New Zealand wool, allowing us to offer significant savings over silk and wool blends in higher-priced Tibetan and Nepalese rugs.”

He adds the goal is to focus on recreating expensive hand-knotted looks so Martha Stewart Rugs retailers can reach out to an even broader base of consumers.”

Joe Barkley, executive vice president of Kaleen, said last year’s licensing agreement with Paula Dean was a “major breakthrough” for the rug maker, which also marked the company’s entrance into the machine-made category.

This year, Kaleen displayed three new Paula Deen collections— Porch & Home, a machine-made, indoor-outdoor polypropylene collection; Comfort, a machine- made, space-dyed polypropylene collection, and Signature, a hand-tufted collection.

Besides notable names associated with new collections, a general fashion focus in High Point leaned on such terms as “timeless” and “classic.” When in doubt, stick to what’s working, is a consensus shared by many in the industry.

In the same way, rug companies offered styles that meet various decorating needs. “With introductions being made in a variety of constructions and price points, market attendees were assured they would find products for every consumer,” points out Leah Feizy of Feizy Import & Export.

As examples, she pointed to the company’s new Ravi, Coltrane and Saphir collections. Ravi presents the classic designs of the great Persian masters with traditional curvilinear floral patterns with ornate medallions; Coltrane is a multi-textured patchwork of warm, earthy tones and nature-inspired motifs, while Saphir offers a mixture of high and low piles, with each piece having textural appeal.