Design Students Find Inspiration in Flora and Fauna
Seven Arcadia students are competing against 100 regional design students for the first Morrow Prize for creating Langhorne Carpet’s inaugural Eco Line. In search of inspiration, they toured two iconic local conservation-education sites: the Philadelphia International Flower Show and Philadelphia Zoo. Their trips were part of their field research into rare and threatened species in the animal and plant kingdoms.
Sketchpads in hand, the students visited the Flower Show on March 6, where they met with orchid expert and Pennsylvania Horticultural Society President Drew Becker. Students walked the floor to gain inspiration for the Flora-inspired design. The aspiring designers reconvened at the Zoo on March 8 for another program to help provide inspiration for the fauna designs.
The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, beneficiary of the Flower Show, and the Zoo, will be receiving a portion of the sales of the Eco Line carpets woven on Langhorne’s legendary Jacquard Wilton looms.
Bill Morrow, President of the carpet mill, said, “We are honored to be involved with PHS and the Zoo and the students are excited about their visits as they develop design concepts for our first global Eco Line of carpets. Since we were ‘green’ long before it became fashionable—using only fibers such as wool and alpaca—it was only ‘natural’ for the competitors to include field trips to the Flower Show and Zoo as part of their research and for us to support their mission through our sales of the winning designs in the plant and animal categories.”
Sponsors for the Morrow Design Competition include the British Wool Marketing Board and the Marketplace Design Center, which will showcase the designs publicly and host an awards ceremony on April 27.
Arcadia’s participants are Naomi Fesseha ’14, Ashley McIntyre ’14, April Stanke ’14, Dana Waldman’14, Stephanie Ebner ’13, Katherine Canfield ’13 and Courtney Sanchez ’13.
The competition also includes design students from Philadelphia University, Temple University’s Tyler School of Art, University of the Arts, Art Institute of Philadelphia, Drexel University, University of Delaware and Rider University.
