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| Medical office suite with Global Industries furniture and calming color palette |
A few weeks ago Megumi Haus and I had the wonderful opportunity to visit Global Industries in Toronto, Canada. What at tour! I have been specifying furniture from their family of 40 unique factories for about three years, but seeing the production in real time was fantastic!
Our first tour was of a factory that recycles wood and plastic into furniture components, such as seat pans and backs. Company-wide this amounts to 2,000 tons of scrap diverted annually from the landfill. Cardboard packing is 80% recycled and cardboard scraps become acoustic panel filler. Scrap fabric, to the tune of 100 tons per year, becomes insulation or very cool cloth shoulder bags.
We saw computer aided pattern cutting where the bits of scrap, particularly for solid prints, are tiny! Leather cutting is taken to a new level of artistry – the entire hide is scanned in one pass with patterns and imperfections noted like a map. Cutting patterns are adapted to each individual ‘map’ and the very best sections become furniture and cushion centerpieces. All foam products used at Global are 100% free of chlorofluorcarbons and the company is initiating the use of soy-based adhesives to reduce petro-chemical uses.
Global Industries was started by Canadian business icon Saul Feldberg in 1966. By the 1980’s Global was seriously engaged in the pursuit and application of recycling and environmentally sound manufacturing to make next generation products. Today, the group of companies is interwoven in form and function, yet each one must maintain its own profitability. I was perhaps most impressed by the dedication Global Group demonstrates to manufacturing as much as possible in North America while providing well-managed, living-wage jobs to a wide diversity of employees.
Most of the finished products we saw would be considered mid-range and are less expensive than many designer options, yet they are well designed and very well made. I feel good about specifying products from these companies. –
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| Nicole and Megumi in the Chairman's chair |
Nicole Cecil, ASID, LEED AP ID+C, provides interior design and consulting to clients looking for both a great look and a healthy working environment. To read about Global’s environmental practices visit
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