Is Furniture Still Made in North Carolina
1 calendar week each April and Oct, the basement of the First United Methodist Church building in High Signal, North Carolina, is bustling with designers, bloggers, and editors from New York, Los Angeles, and across the United States, Europe, and Asia, eating homemade turkey chili and pimento cheese sandwiches at folding plastic tables. This somewhat unlikely colliding of worlds is Parson'southward Table, a sort of pop-up restaurant run past entrepreneurial churchgoers—and ane of the many quirky, beloved traditions of High Point Market, the biggest event that you lot may have never heard of.
So What Is High Point?
High Point, for most of the year, is a modestly sized urban center in the Piedmont Triad region of Due north Carolina, whose approximately 100,000 population (108,629 as of the 2014 demography) is comprised largely of students, faculty, and staff at the tony private High Point Academy. Twice a twelvemonth, though, the city nearly doubles in size, attracting more 80,000 visitors every bit information technology plays host to Loftier Bespeak Article of furniture Market, the largest furniture trade fair in the world and a biannual showcase of the region'south virtually celebrated industry.
The biannual event draws in an estimated $140 million in revenue for the city between hotel reservations, dining, transportation, and more. The First United Methodist Church congregation isn't the only grouping to smartly make an anarchistic concern out of the market place: Dozens of food trucks and popular-up vendors head to the urban center for marketplace, and the city'south (and neighboring towns') fire department hires itself out as drivers for fairgoers—afterwards all, you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone knows the fastest routes effectually the urban center better.
How Did it Become So Huge?
Loftier Point'southward niche industry comes, as near exercise, thank you to a combination of geographical and cultural factors. The city, situated amongst forestland that offered a salubrious supply of timber, saw its commencement surge of furniture-making in the 17th century, when English makers settled there and connected their craft in a new homeland. During the Reconstruction era, burgeoning manufacturers benefited from inexpensive labor, which only increased with the completion of the Southern Railway by the belatedly 19th century, an advocacy that also enabled for easy consign of the region's products.
In 1909, the High Bespeak Article of furniture Exposition Company and the Furniture Manufacturers Exposition Company joined forces to put on a new trade show, and the Southern Furniture Marketplace was born. The event's history after that by and large follows the course of American history at large: A standstill during World War I, a postwar boom, success in the 1920s followed by a devastating lull after the 1929 Crash, so the added blow of World State of war II and, later on, an even larger postwar blast. The market has continued to fluctuate since and then (with a notable dip post-obit the 2008 recession), simply, nevertheless, High Indicate has remained the world'southward largest furniture market for decades.
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Just How Big Is information technology?
The city comprises some 12 meg square feet of showroom. Yes, one thousand thousand. These hold everything from carpets to canopy beds—and, truly, everything in betwixt. In the Suites at Market Square, one of Loftier Point's main buildings, dozens of antiquarian and vintage vendors too offer a more aged alternative to the newness rolling out each flavor.
Though Loftier Point's designation as a furniture capital stems largely from the manufacturing done in and around its metropolis limits, past now its exhibitors hail from far and broad, with companies from all over the world renting or operating infinite in the city to show at each market place.
Fifty-fifty in our ever-globalized earth, though, in that location's still plenty of manufacturing going on inside a short altitude of the city. Heritage brands like Hickory Chair and Century Article of furniture too as younger companies like Mitchell Gold Bob Williams and Lee Industries brand their furniture in factories in the expanse, some over a hundred years old. In recent years, new businesses have recognized the surface area'south expertise in manufacturing by setting upwardly store in that location: Even though it doesn't show at the market, startup furniture make Maiden Dwelling house, for case, makes its straight-to-consumer furniture in third- and 4th-generation family factories in the region.
Why Have I Never Heard of it?
If you're not a professional designer—or even, possibly, if you are—chances are high yous wouldn't know virtually the market place unless you were either a fanatic furniture enthusiast or lived in the surface area. That'southward because, despite its large size, the marketplace is open up exclusively to the merchandise—that is, merely licensed interior designers or retail buyers can enter the hundreds of showroom spaces throughout the city and its many convention centers (with the exception of selected events, which may be open up to the public at the discretion of their hosts).
What Happens There the Rest of the Year?
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In the off season, High Signal becomes somewhat of a ghost town—12 one thousand thousand square anxiety of showroom infinite is a lot of empty infinite when those showrooms are closed. But, recent innovations in the metropolis are striving to span that gap: Institute Vii, a coworking and event space-meets-business incubator is looking to concenter young businesses and entice them to work in the surface area year-round. Meanwhile, up the road, piece of work at the factories will keep humming along, churning out your next sofa or armchair. And now you know where it comes from.
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