Shear Brilliance is a wool showcase which was held at The Cloud in Auckland on Nov 12, 2012, hosted by the Campaign for Wool. The exhibition showcases New Zealand’s creativity and innovation with woollen textiles and products.
“From a carpet couch to a wool peg necklace, from grass grown on wool dags to Tiki artwork on Merino, from Zambesi’s carpet bag to the loftiness of wool knops, Shear Brilliance will surprise and delight anyone who might have thought wool was passe,” says Stephen Fookes, Chair, Campaign for Wool New Zealand.
The event was attended by HRH The Prince of Wales as well as nearly 200 invited guests and dignitaries and VIPs from architectural, interior, and related industries. Locus Research was there with Encircle, a product Locus developed between 2007 and 2010 for The Merino Company (TMC).
A range of wool products from purely craft to fully commercial innovations and new technologies where on exhibit. There was also a range of demonstrations including a shearing demo by world and Golden Shears champion shearer John Kirkpatrick; a wool flammability demo by the New Zealand Fire Service and presentations by Prince Charles himself, Stephen Fookes (CEO of NZWTA Ltd), Stephen McDougall (of Studio Pacific Architecture, the ambassador for the Campaign for Wool), Minister David Carter, Jeremy Moon (Icebreaker), and Michael Pervan (Altitude Aerospace Interiors) to name a few.
“The wool industry also has a long and dedicated research capability creating a constant flow of innovations and new opportunities for users. This is useful for the architectural and interior professionals to see. I challenge them to consider the attributes of wool when they are specifying fit-outs.” says Stephen Fookes.
