A very simple, fast, and cost-effective way to change the dynamic of a room is the use of slip covers.
Bring that summer white to your space with a number of options by Pottery Barn and these glorious accent pillows from ethniciti will give you instant gratification. What a wonderful start to the summer!
Earlier this year when I launched the ethniciti blog, I noted that during my over 30-year-long career devoted to understanding consumer needs and designing environments to make their lives easier and more fulfilling, not once have I been called upon to create a design or merchandise strategy directed to the modern African-American consumer.
I started my business, ethniciti, to fill the unmet needs of African-American consumers and enable them to acquire quality home fashion goods that truly reflect their lifestyle, culture, knowledge, and sense of fashion.
ethniciti offers a new way of thinking, a feeling of organized ecleccticism. Our exciting, African-inspired collections embody a new vision of the African-American style – how African-Americans see themselves and how they want others to see them
Now I am pleased to announce the launch of the ethniciti online catalog. Take a look at the collections which we have carefully drawn from throughout the Diaspora, featuring works of Pan-African artisans and their representatives.
Bill Sands
As a good steward of the environment, I am always on the lookout for products that satisfy my fashion sense as well as being responsible to the land.
I recently came across a company, Sleeperwoods, situated close to the Kruger National Park in White River, South Africa. They utilize reclaimed sleepers (railroad ties) as well as a range of recycled hardwoods to fashion unique furniture and tabletop accessories. Their design approach offers products for both a contemporary and causal settings. Take a look.
As designers we begin each assignment with a high expectations in creating an exciting and memorable living space for our clients. As we move through the discovery, then the creative phases, we begin to visualize the end game, what will it look like what will it feel like. What we do know is our clients expect a space that reflects who they are and how they want people to see them.
I am always inspired by Jessica Harris, noted African-American author and educator whose writings weave a masterful web of food and places of the Diaspora. I see an opportunity to help our clients celebrate the completion of a new space with a 
gathering that ties together the notion of African-inspired interior design with tangible expressions of styles and tastes.
Here are a few of our approaches. Let me know about yours.
With the coming of spring we can expect a few constants – daffodils, lawn mower noise and new spring catalog from Crate & Barrel that looks a lot like last year and the year
before. As one of the country’s premier lifestyle retailers, they have mastered the concept of predetermined solutions: if we didn’t sell it to you last year we simply recycle the palette with perhaps some small modifications of style and present it again as new and trendy.
Don’t get me wrong. I believe C&B is one of the best at inspiring customers with effective visual marketing and a fill-in-the-blanks approach. But 
when do we move from room-in-a-box to a more open and eclectic approach that reflects a modern reality, in particular a response to the tastes of the modern African-American consumer?
Can you image the expectation and joy of receiving a catalog that projected a sense of “organized eclecticism” that would focus on the inspirational needs and wants of the African- American consumer and others who appreciate the uniqueness and richness of the culture? I can.
Sadly this won’t happen with idle coffee-and-donuts conversations about the “opportunities” in the market. Good, bad or indifferent there is an existing process in the design, 
licensing and manufacturing of home furnishings. From my point of view that will not change in the short term.
In an effort to discover more efficient and profitable approaches for interior and product designers to bring their designs to market, we have formed ethnicitiSTYLE. We are
collaboration of professional designers formed to pool our energies and resources to create African-American home fashion collections that will be developed and licensed to mainstream manufactures and distributors. Our goal is to create new lines of home fashion developed, designed, and managed by African Americans.
It is time. Let me know what you are thinking.
