Hooker links with PGA Home, designer McMillan
By Jeff Linville -- Furniture Today, September 17, 2001
MARTINSVILLE, Va. — MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Hooker Furniture has landed licensing deals with PGA Tour Home and with designer Patricia Hart McMillan.
The manufacture and importer has 15 pieces of occasional and accent furniture set for October as part of the PGA Tour Home Collection, which includes licensees in apparel, golf equipment and video games.
Hooker's offerings include golf images on hand-painted chests, consoles and entertainment centers, and a bar table with a base made of a faux golf bag and clubs, retailing for $699. A table with golf club legs and a leather top will retail for about $259. Materials include hardwoods, glass, metal, leather and twill. The entertainment center has a built-in golf ball return so golfers can practice putting while watching TV.
Vanguard Furniture is the master licensee for the furniture segment and makes a full line of upholstered furniture. Currently, Keller produces PGA Tour Home dining room and bedroom furniture. As of now, no company is licensed to make home office and home entertainment pieces, said Birger Rasmussen, Vanguard president. Those categories soon will be handled by Hooker, he said.
The style of Hooker's products is "complimentary to what's out there," said Kim Shaver, director of communications for Hooker.
"Hooker's strength in occasional and accent furniture will allow us to bring exceptional values to the collection and to gain additional exposure in the marketplace for PGA Tour Home," said John Bray, Vanguard chairman and chief executive officer.
The furniture will be featured in furniture stores and in 30 PGA Tour shops across the country.
Hooker is bringing "retro metro" styling to home office and home entertainment furniture with the launch of Cranbrook, a licensed collection with Patricia Hart McMillan, an interior designer, author of "Sun Country Elegant" and co-author of "Sun Country Style" and "Home Decorating for Dummies."
Inspired by contemporary architecture, Cranbrook emphasizes graceful lines. The home entertainment wall features maple solids and an African veneer called etimoe. The side piers have a curio look with glass shelves and halogen lighting and feature cherry veneers. The three-piece wall is expected to retail for about $4,000; with corner cases, the five-piece set will retail around $6,000. A desk offers a marble top with cherry and etimoe veneers and antique bronze hardware; it retails for about $1,000.
Inspiring the collection was a contemporary ranch house of architect Bart Voorsanger, featured in McMillan's "Sun Country Elegant."
"Country is moving to contemporary," said McMillan. "It is saying goodbye to humble pie and nostalgia and looking for light, bright, sunny space and deco style."
As for the collection's office pieces, she said, "The home office is no longer makeshift.… Like the kitchen, it's going to become another 'living room,' a fixture of the American household."
