Feature – Page 8 – Specialty Fabrics Review

Working with architects

January 1, 2018 | Feature

Key to the success of a productive partnership: exploration, preparation, communication and education, with a firm grasp of details and a final vision for the project. Fabrics and architecture have been partners for millennia and have worked together to create some of the most iconic, useful and bea…

Marine tension shade options

January 1, 2018 | Feature

Marine fabricators help boat owners expand shading options with stretched fabric. It could easily be argued that the pleasures of boating are best appreciated on a deck rather than in a cabin. But protection from sun exposure requires more than that provided by a wide-brimmed hat. With that kind of …

Creating a welcoming workplace to retain employees

January 1, 2018 | Feature

To prevent employee turnover, create a workplace that provides continuous learning, competitive pay and benefits and open-minded management. Like many industries that rely on skilled workers, the specialty fabrics industry is facing a shortage of qualified personnel. As manufacturers and fabricators…

Inspiration-driven marine fabrication, and sheltering San Francisco’s homeless

January 1, 2018 | Feature, Perspective

Having a really good life is not financially driven. It’s inspiration driven,” says Liz Diaz, MFC, owner of North Beach Marine Canvas in San Francisco, Calif. “Working on and around the water is a singularly lovely employment. I am inspired all the time by my location, by the San Francisco Des…

On the march

December 1, 2017 | Feature

For several years the U.S. military market has been characterized by base closures and troop drawdowns, which has had an admittedly dampening effect on the need for and spending on military textiles. The United States isn’t the only geographic market for these products, nor are these textiles limi…

Protect and conserve potable water

December 1, 2017 | Feature

If you’ve had a glass of clean water today, you can likely thank a fabric-based product. Engineered fabrics, membranes and geosynthetics perform behind-the-scenes work to ensure that communities have access to adequate potable water and clean waterways. Creative fabric uses also hold promise in de…

Narrow fabrics’ widening reach

December 1, 2017 | Feature

Corporate administrators tend to base management decisions on the Pareto Principle (80 percent of business comes from 20 percent of the clientele). Textile engineer Connie Huffa argues that can be a shortsighted way of thinking. “Opportunities lie in the 20 percent—the business we all would have…

Finding solutions: teamwork and initiative

December 1, 2017 | Feature

Research shows that cross-functional collaboration can improve the ability to solve complex problems, deliver higher quality products and services faster, and boost customer satisfaction. To see these kinds of results means building a team that listens to customers and works across departments to fi…

Bill Coppins turns a canvas shop into a design and development powerhouse

December 1, 2017 | Feature

“We keep experimenting with a product until we get it right, which is really what we’re about,” says Bill Coppins, owner and director of W.A. Coppins Ltd. in Motueka, New Zealand. “With jobbing work you’re always competing against someone down the road. So I thought: Let’s get out th…

New IFAI chairman Steve Ellington shares his vision for the Industrial Fabrics Association International

November 1, 2017 | Feature, Perspective

With the geopolitical challenges and opportunities the specialty fabrics industry faces, we, as an association, need to make sure that we continue to educate our members and provide them with opportunities,” says Steve Ellington, president of Trivantage LLC, Glen Raven’s distribution and marketi…

Category: Feature

Working with architects

Marine tension shade options

Creating a welcoming workplace to retain employees

Inspiration-driven marine fabrication, and sheltering San Francisco’s homeless

On the march

Protect and conserve potable water

Narrow fabrics’ widening reach

Finding solutions: teamwork and initiative

Bill Coppins turns a canvas shop into a design and development powerhouse

New IFAI chairman Steve Ellington shares his vision for the Industrial Fabrics Association International