Josh Cochran worked deep in the coal mines of West Virginia since he was 22 years old, pulling a six-figure salary that allowed him to buy a home with his wife Stephanie and hunt and fish in his spare time.
That ended two years ago when, at the age of 43, he was diagnosed with advanced black lung disease. Hes now waiting for a lung transplant, breathes with the help of an oxygen tank, and needs help from his wife to do basic tasks around the house.
His saving grace, he says, is that he can still earn a living. A federal program run by the Mine Safety and Health Administration and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health called Part 90 meant he was relocated from underground when he got his diagnosis to a desk job dispatching coal trucks to the same company, retaining his pay.
“Part 90 – that’s only the thing you got,” he told Reuters while signing a stack of documents needed for the transplant, a simple task that left him winded. “You can come out from underground, make what you made, and then they can’t just get rid of you.”
That program, which relocates coal miners diagnosed with black lung to safer jobs at the same pay – along with a handful of others intended to protect the nations coal miners from the resurgence of black lung – is grinding to a halt due to mass layoffs and office closures imposed by President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, according to Reuters reporting.
Reuters interviews with more than a dozen people involved in medical programs serving the coal industry, and a review of internal documents from NIOSH, show that at least three such federal programs have stopped their work in recent weeks.
A decades-old program operated by NIOSH to detect lung disease in coal miners, for example, has been suspended. Related programs to provide x-rays and lung tests at mine sites have also shut down and it is now unclear who will enforce safety regulations like new limits on silica dust exposure after nearly half of the offices of MSHA are under review to have their leases terminated.
The details about the black lung programs halted by the government’s mass layoffs and funding cuts have not previously been reported.
“Its going to be devastating to miners,” said Anita Wolfe, a 40-year NIOSH veteran who remains in touch with the agency. “Nobody is going to be monitoring the mines.”
The cuts come as Trump voices support for the domestic coal industry, a group that historically has supported the president.
At a White House ceremony flanked by coal workers in hard hats earlier this month, Trump signed executive orders meant to boost the industry, including by prolonging the life of aging coal-fired power plants.
“For too long, coal has been a dirty word that most are afraid to speak about,” said Jeff Crowe, who Trump identified as a West Virginia miner. Crowe is the superintendent of American Consolidated Natural Resources, successor to Murray Energy.
“We’re going to put the miners back to work,” Trump said during the ceremony. “They are great people, with great families, and come from areas of the country that we love and we really respect.”
Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees NIOSH, said that streamlining government will better position HHS to carry out its Congressionally mandated work protecting Americans.
Courtney Parella, a spokesperson for the Department of Labor said MSHA inspectors “continue to carry out their core mission to protect the health and safety of Americas miners.”
Black lung has been on the rise over the last two decades, and has increasingly been reported by young workers in their 30s and 40s despite declining coal production.
NIOSH estimates that 20% of coal miners in Central Appalachia now suffer from some form of black lung disease, the highest rate that has been detected in 25 years, as workers in the aging mines blast through rock to reach diminishing coal seams. Around 43,000 people are employed by the coal industry, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
More mining, more risk
Around 875 of NIOSHs roughly 1,000-strong workforce across the country were terminated amid sweeping job cuts announced by HHS this month, according to three sources who worked for NIOSH.
Thats put the departments flagship black lung program, the Coal Workers Health Surveillance Program, on hold, according to an internal NIOSH email dated April 4.
“We will continue to process everything we currently have for as long as we can. We have no further information about the future of CWHSP at this time,” the email says.
The CWHSP’s regular black lung screenings, which deploy mobile trailers to coal mines to test coal miners on site have ended too, because theres no money to fuel the vehicles or epidemiologists to review the on-site x-rays or lung tests, according to sources familiar with the program.
For many miners, this program is the sole provider of medical checkups, according to NIOSH veteran Wolfe.
The loss of staff at NIOSH has also crippled black lung-afflicted miners’ ability to get relocated with pay as part of the Part 90 program.
Miners can only become eligible for the Part 90 benefit by submitting lung x-rays to NIOSH that show black lung. But all NIOSH epidemiologists in West Virginia required to review the x-rays were laid off, according to Scott Laney, who lost his job as an epidemiologist.
Laney told Reuters he and his fellow laid-off team have been working in an informal “war room” in his living room to try to draw attention to the issue among Washington lawmakers.
“I want to make sure that if there are more men who are going into the mines as a result of an executive order, or whatever the mechanism, they should be protected when they do their work,” he said.
Sam Petsonk, a West Virginia attorney who represents black lung patients, said relocating sick miners is crucial because the risks of continuing to work in dust-heavy areas while ill are so severe.
“It gets to the point that days and months matter for this program,” he said.
Silica threat
Last year, MSHA finalized a new regulation that would cut by half the permissible exposure limit to crystalline silica for miners and other workers an attempt to combat the rising rates of black lung.
Enforcing that rule, which comes into force in August after being pushed back from April by the Trump administration, may prove difficult given the staff cuts and planned office closures at MSHA, said Chris Williamson, a former Assistant Secretary of Labor for Mine Safety and Health under the Biden administration.
He told Reuters that before he left MSHA in January, there were 20 mine inspector positions unfilled. A pipeline of 90 people that had already secured MSHA inspector job offers, meanwhile, had their offers rescinded after Trump took office, and around 120 other people took buyouts.
Mine inspectors are meant to uphold safety standards that reduce injuries, deaths and illnesses at the mines.
That loss of staff and resources raises the likelihood that black lung could become even more pervasive among Appalachian coal miners particularly if mining activity inceases, said Drew Harris, a black lung specialist in southern Virginia.
“As someone who sees hundreds of miners with this devastating disease it’s hard for me to swallow cutting back on the resources meant to prevent it,” he said.
Kevin Weikle, a 35-year-old miner in West Virginia who was diagnosed with advanced black lung disease during a screening in 2023, said the cuts make no sense at a time the administration wants to see coal output rise and will set back safety standards by decades.
“Don’t get me wrong, I mean, I’m Republican,” Weikle said. “But I think there are smarter ways to produce more coal and not gut safety.”
Valerie Volcovici, Reuters
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Monday sued Uber Technologies, accusing it of signing up some Uber One subscribers without their knowledge and making deceptive claims about the service.
The service costs $9.99 a month and offers discounts on fees associated with Uber’s ride-hailing and food-delivery apps.
Uber falsely claimed that users would save about $25 a month through the service and deceived them about how easy it was to cancel, the FTC said in the lawsuit filed in San Francisco.
“Americans are tired of getting signed up for unwanted subscriptions that seem impossible to cancel,” FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson said. “The Trump-Vance FTC is fighting back on behalf of the American people.”
Uber spokesperson Noah Edwardsen said the company does not sign up or charge customers without their consent.
“We are disappointed that the FTC chose to move forward with this action, but are confident that the courts will agree with what we already know: Uber One’s sign-up and cancellation processes are clear, simple, and follow the letter and spirit of the law,” he said.
Uber has tangled with the FTC several times in the past.
In 2017 the ride-hailing company settled the FTC’s allegations it had made deceptive privacy and data security claims. The following year it agreed to pay $20 million to settle the FTC’s claims it exaggerated prospective earnings in seeking to recruit drivers.
The company fended off criminal charges in 2022 in a settlement where it admitted that its employees had failed to notify the FTC about a 2016 data breach that affected 57 million passengers and drivers.
Jody Godoy, Reuters
Remember the viral Ice Bucket Challenge of 2014? Over a decade later, its backbut this time, the focus is mental health.
If you were living under a rock in 2014, the challenge involved participants pouring ice water over themselves, posting the video to social media, and nominating others to join in, all while raising awareness for a cause. The campaign raised millions for ALS research. Now, it’s making a comebackthis time to support Active Minds, a nonprofit promoting mental health awareness and education for students.
The Mental Illness Needs Discussion (MIND) clubs #SpeakYourMIND campaign launched on Instagram in March, started by a group of students at the University of South Carolina. According to a 2024 U.S. News survey, about 70% of students have struggled with mental health since starting college.
Wade Jefferson, a USC junior, told NBC News he founded the MIND club after losing two friends to suicide. He hopes the campaign will help normalize conversations around mental health. Initially setting a fundraising goal of $500, he didnt expect the challenge to go viral again.
At the time of writing, the campaign has raised $189,056 in donations and drawn participation from high-profile figures like TODAYs Jenna Bush Hager, who nominated stars like Blake Shelton and Scarlett Johansson to keep the trend alive.
Its also earned a nod from the challenges original creators. Were thrilled to see the spirit of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge live on in new forms of activism, the ALS Association said in a statement to NBC News.
At its peak, the original challenge saw everyone from former President George W. Bush to Oprah Winfrey joining in. I think fundraising professionals and nonprofits and causes have sat around tables for years trying to say, Whats going to be our ice bucket challenge, Brett Curtis, director of community fundraising and events at Active Minds, told NBC News. I do think theres a little irony in that it is just the ice bucket challenge again, this time to talk about mental health.
The Department of Agriculture (USDA) has issued a health alert for a pre-cooked, frozen pork carnitas product sold at Aldi grocery stores that “may be contaminated with foreign material, specifically pieces of metal.”
Cargill Meat Solutions manufactures the product for Aldi exclusively, so it was only sold at Aldi stores. According to the USDA, the product was shipped to Aldi stores nationwide, so the alert applies to all U.S. locations.
Here’s what you need to know.
What’s happened?
To be clear, the USDA’s Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is issuing a public health alert, not a recall, “because this product is no longer available for sale in commerce.”
The problem was discovered during routine maintenance when Cargill found equipment damage may have contaminated the carnitas product with metal pieces.
There have been no confirmed reports of injury due to consumption of these products. (Anyone concerned about an injury should contact a healthcare provider.)
How do I know if I bought the affected pork product?
The fully cooked, sleeved tray packages were produced from April 1 to 2, 2025. The health alert applies to products with the following details:
Name: Pork Carnitas Seasoned & Seared Pork with Juices Slow Cooked with Citrus
Size: 16-oz tray
Use-by dates: June 30, 2025 or July 1, 2025
Establishment number: 46049
What should I do if I bought the pork product?
Consumers who have purchased the affected products should thrown them away or return them to Aldi.
Although this product is no longer available for sale, FSIS is concerned that some product may be in consumers’ refrigerators or freezers.
Consumers can contact Cargill’s Consumer Hotline at 844-419-1574 with any questions. Those with food safety questions can contact the USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline by calling the toll-free number 888-674-6854, or via email here.
Want more housing market stories from Lance Lamberts ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter.
National home prices have risen by 1.2% year-over-year from March 2024 to March 2025, according to the Zillow Home Value Index, a decelerated rate from the 4.6% year-over-year rate last spring. However, not every housing market is seeing rising home prices.
Among the nation’s 300 largest metro-area housing markets, 60 markets are seeing falling home prices on a year-over-year basis. Thats up from 42 markets in February and 31 markets in January.
While home prices continue to rise in regions with tight inventorysuch as much of the Northeast and Midwestmany housing markets in states like Arizona, Texas, Florida, and Louisiana, where inventory has now surpassed pre-pandemic 2019 levels, are experiencing modest home price corrections, according to ResiClubs latest analysis.
These year-over-year declines are evident in major metros such as Austin (-4.6%); Tampa (-4.5%); San Antonio (-2.7%); Phoenix (-2.5%); Dallas (-2.4%); Jacksonville, Florida (-2.3%); Orlando (-2.2%); New Orleans (-1.9%); Atlanta (-1.8%); and Miami (-1.5%).
!function(){"use strict";window.addEventListener("message",(function(a){if(void 0!==a.data["datawrapper-height"]){var e=document.querySelectorAll("iframe");for(var t in a.data["datawrapper-height"])for(var r,i=0;r=e[i];i++)if(r.contentWindow===a.source){var d=a.data["datawrapper-height"][t]+"px";r.style.height=d}}}))}();
The markets seeing the most softness, where homebuyers are gaining leverage, are primarily located in Sun Belt regions, particularly the Gulf Coast and Mountain West. These areas saw major price surges during the pandemic housing boom, with home price growth outpacing local income levels. As pandemic-driven migration slowed and mortgage rates rose, markets like Tampa and Austin faced challenges, relying on local income levels to support frothy home prices.
This softening trend is further compounded by an abundance of new home supply in the Sun Belt. Builders are often willing to lower prices or offer affordability incentives to maintain sales, which also has a cooling effect on the resale market. Some buyers, who would have previously considered existing homes, are now opting for new homes with more favorable deals.
!function(){"use strict";window.addEventListener("message",(function(a){if(void 0!==a.data["datawrapper-height"]){var e=document.querySelectorAll("iframe");for(var t in a.data["datawrapper-height"])for(var r,i=0;r=e[i];i++)if(r.contentWindow===a.source){var d=a.data["datawrapper-height"][t]+"px";r.style.height=d}}}))}();
Will this softening continue this year? It looks like it.
A key indicator to watch will be active inventory levels. If weaker markets like Tampa continue to see substantial increases in active inventoryalready above pre-pandemic levelsit may signal ongoing softening, potentially creating more opportunities for homebuyers.
Fast Company is the official media partner of Summit Detroit.
Summit is an organization that hosts global ideas conferences and immersive experiences. And the programming is always grounded by six core pillars: thought leadership, health and happiness, performance arts, culinary arts, fine art, and impactall with the express intention to inspire deep attendee presence and build long-term connections both professionally and personally.
Many of our Summit community members are building and running large high-profile companies, managing teams, and are surrounded by people and things to do. But our business leaders often feel incredibly lonely in their pursuits, says Jody Levy, CEO and global director of Summit. There’s an impact to a Summit gathering that invites commonality and allows these types of high-octane doers the chance to meet one another, relate to one another, and forge lifelong professional and personal friendships.
This June 5-8, Summit lands in Detroit with an array of speakers, teachers, and artists who will bring their unique perspectives to Summits programming pillars.
Thought leadership and impact
Summit community members will be immersed in thoughtful discussions with prolific business and technology leaders including Ev Williams, co-founder of Twitter, Medium, and Mozi; Franz von Holzhausen, chief designer at Tesla; Dan Gilbert, founder and chairman of Rocket Companies; Tim Urban, cofounder of the podcast Wait But Why; futurist Pablos Holman; and many more.
For those steeped in social justice, impact, and the humanities, Summit is curating a series of special sessions with influential leaders including Dr. Bernice A. King; Ashley Bell, founder and CEO of fintech platform Ready Life; and former NFL linebacker Dhani Jones discussing his investment in Holladay Bank & Trust, which will become the first Black-owned commercial bank through acquisition.
Throughout Summits programming are sessions that pull from the past to help illustrate the future. For example, Eames Demetrios will take the stage to discuss the legacy of his grandparents, Charles and Ray Eameswidely considered among the most influential American designers of the 20th centuryand their longstanding connection to Detroit and their manufacturing innovations born out of wartime.
There’s such a direct correlation to this moment that we are in, Levy says. Theres an opportunity to reinvent not just how we do things but the materials we use, the manufacturing methods we have access to, and how we will reinvent to sustain a complex manufacturing future.
Health and happiness
Summits lineup within its health and happiness pillar includes author and psychotherapist Lori Gottlieb; medical diagnostic entrepreneur and cofounder and CEO of Function Health, Jonathan Swerdlin; integrative medicine practitioner Dr. Linda Lancaster; and death expert Elena Brower. There will also be movement modalities and interactive workshops with Primal Moves from Ibiza, Spain; an African- and Caribbean-inspired dance workshop led by Stacy Letrice; and fitness and yoga sessions with acclaimed instructors including Melissa Levy, Jacey Cunningham, Kim Strother, and Ally Bogard.
Performing and fine arts
Underscoring Summits focus on fine art and the importance of live performance are immersive experiences including a conversation on the art of resilience from legendary choreographer and director Bill T. Jones; evening comedy sets from Ben Gleib (yes, he does roast the entrepreneurs, Levy promises); and live performances by The Wailers, Aluna, Coco & Breezy, LP Giobbi, Moodymann, and Tony Touch, as well as a popup experience with vinyl listening bar Dante’s HiFi.
Culinary arts
And it wouldnt be a Summit event without a culinary track, more specifically one that centers Detroits culinary renaissance. Featured this year are Javier Bardauil, chef and owner of Barda and Puma Detroit, specializing in Argentinian cuisine; Brad Greenhill, executive chef and co-owner of Takoi, a popular Thai-inspired eatery; Warda Bouguettaya, owner of the James Beard Award-winning bakery Warda Pâtisserie; Alexandra Clark, founder and head chocolatier of Bon Bon Bon Chocolate; and Hamisi Mamba and Nadia Nijimbere, owners of the East African restaurants Waka and Baobab Fare.Despite the structure of Summits programming pillars, Levy notes no one has to stick to one track or interest. A typical day at Summit can take on a variety of explorations.
Our community doesn’t come to sit in a space and be a voyeur at a talk. Theyre in it, in flow, they get to participate, let their curiosity lead, and the true lessons and connections often happen in the in-betweens, before and after sessions, on walks to venues, meetups, mixers, in line for lattes, she says. We get to create an environment for our people to have the choose-your-own-adventure that makes each Summit so unique.Adding to what makes this Summit event distinctive is its host city of Detroit.
Detroit, at this moment, in this time, is thriving, Levy says. There are so many people that have come in from around the world: artists, entrepreneurs, business leaders, founders, investors, chefs from all over the globe, musical talent, explorers. There is this thriving creator economy in Detroit that matches the curious and experimental spirit of Summit.Learn more about Summit and apply to attend Summit Detroit this June 5-8, 2025. Tickets start at $4,750.
At a time when many fast-casual chains are struggling to get customers in the door, and rethinking their next moves both at home and internationally due to Trump’s trade wars, Chipotle Mexican Grill is expanding.
The fast-casual restaurant announced on Monday that it signed a development agreement with Alsea to open its first location in Mexico early next year. Alsea operates the Latin American and European locations of a number of food and beverage chains, including Starbucks, Dominos Pizza, and Burger King, according to CNBC.
Chipotle also indicated plans to explore additional expansion markets in the region, signaling further locations in Latin America.
“We are confident that our responsibly sourced, classically cooked real food will resonate with guests in Mexico,” Nate Lawton, chief business development officer at Chipotle, said in a statement. “The country’s familiarity with our ingredients and affinity for fresh food make it an attractive growth market for our company.”
The fast-casual chain, which currently operates more than 3,700 restaurants, also reiterated its plans to open between 315 and 345 new restaurants this year, with a long-term target of operating 7,000 locations in the U.S. and Canada. The popular chain opened 304 new restaurants in 2024, its most openings in a single year. (In 2023, it opened 271 locations, and in 2022, 200 restaurants.)
And this is not Chipotle’s first foray beyond the U.S. borders. It operates 58 locations in Canada, 20 in the United Kingdom, six in France, and two in Germany. In 2023, it signed its first international development agreement with Alshaya Group to open restaurants in the Middle East; as a result, it now operates three restaurants in Kuwait and two in the United Arab Emirates.
Last year, many beloved U.S. fast-casual and restaurant chains struggled to stay afloat, while many others shut down or filed for bankruptcy. The majority of Wahlburgers locations shut down in January, and fast-casual chain Roti has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, as have both Red Lobster and Buca di Beppo.
In a time where tariff price hikes are invading seemingly every element of life, diving into a video game could offer a welcome reprieve, both spiritually and fiscally. Digital video games do not require materials, shipping, or manufacturing costs, allowing them to cross borders without incurring extra fees. And the video game industry has been shifting to digital long before Trump’s so-called Liberation Day.
In terms of software, PC gaming is now overwhelmingly digital, and physical versions are largely obsolete, says Manu Rosier, market intelligence director at Newzoo. We do not expect tariffs to significantly impact the price of video game software.
However, video-game-industry analysts say that although the prices of digital software likely will not increase, stress about the tariffs may still cause a shift in U.S. consumer spending on games.
When thinking about the ways that spending on games may change in the coming months, Mat Piscatella, executive games director at Circana, says that its important to consider the ways that other parts of life will be impacted by the tariffs. One of the big reasons for what we saw happen with the November elections was around the cost of everyday-spending categories like groceries and housing, he says. That certainly won’t be alleviated in the current tariff layout, and so that could further push video game consumers toward the big free-to-play or more accessible games.
Because of this, Piscatella tentatively projects that the video game industry may see a drop in demand for premium video games. However, games with long and deep connections to their player basessuch as Fortnite, Minecraft, Grand Theft Auto, Roblox, and Call of Dutycould gain more ground. In Newzoo’s 2025 PC and Console Gaming Report, analysts found that in 2024, 58% of all PC gaming revenue came from microtransactions, such as players purchasing loot boxes and other in-game goods. This was only a 1.4% growth increase from 2023, but tariff worries could prompt a steeper incline. Spending $5 or $20 on a game you already love is easier than dropping $80 on a new title, says Piscatella. These titles already have social and monetary hooks that keep players engaged.
This continued engagement is crucial in the video game industry, which hit peak audience growth during the worst years of the COVID-19 pandemic. From the late ’70s onward, every year we would have more people playing and more people playing for more hours, says Piscatella. Then, in 2020 and 2021, we had this huge wave of people come in. So we hit a ceiling on both the number of players and hours of engagement, in the U.S. in particular. Ever since then, the goals of the industry have shifted from growing the audience to maintaining and increasing the spending from the existing audience.
One part of the gaming industry that will have a more difficult time with retention is undoubtedly physical games and gaming hardware in general. This is bad news for a company like Nintendo which was set to begin preorders in the U.S. for its Switch 2 but had to push the date back to April 24 due to tariff announcements.
A chief concern revolves around the Switch 2. Nintendo systems are the most physical forward of all the in-market devices. They’ve made a big point about delivering physical software so games could be easily shared among family members, says Piscatella. How many units of Switch hardware can you even allocate to the U.S., given all the uncertainties, right? How much is the potential market for physical cartridges really going to be, at least in the short term?
Rosier agrees. Tariffs could affect packaged games, which are already set to be more expensive than their digital versions,” he says. “This might encourage more players to shift to digital, and Nintendo may adjust physical production accordingly.
However, it’s important to note that economic factors are shifting so rapidly that it is difficult to make any solid predictions of the future to come. Right now the uncertainties are off the charts, says Piscatella. People will still love video games and they’ll still play them, but how they play them and how they spend on them, that might certainly change.
Since President Trump announced a sweeping slate of tariffs earlier this month, a highly uncertain market has led to supply-chain disruptions for everything from iPhones to electric bikes and Volvo cars. Now, the tariffs are coming for something else: your packages.
The German-based shipping company DHL announced yesterday that it plans to suspend shipments of any packages over $800 to customers in the United States, starting today.
According to a press release from the company, the move comes as a result of recent U.S Customs regulatory updates, which have caused DHL to face multi-day transit delays to the U.S from any origin for shipments with a declared customs value exceeding USD 800.
The customs updates in question were instated on April 9 by the Trump administration to enforce its strict new tariffs. The updates require a more time-consuming formal customs process for any package entering the U.S. thats valued at $800 or morea major change from the previous restrictions, which only required formal entry processing for packages over $2,500.
This change has caused a surge in formal customs clearances, which we are handling around the clock, DHL said in the release.
What does this mean for US customers?
For American DHL customers, the companys update means that it wont be possible to receive any package through DHL valued at more than $800. However, the company noted that business-to-business deliveries valued over $800 will not be affected by the new procedure.
DHL also clarified that this measure is temporary, and that it will share updates as the situation evolves.
DHLs new restrictions come just days after Hong Kongs postal service announced that it would cease handling any package shipments to the U.S., citing the Trump administrations abusive new tariffs and regulations.
These new shipping limitations could be a harbinger of whats to come. As international shipping becomes more complicated and importers are faced with rising fees, many experts agree that shipping costs for consumers are likely to spikeor, in the case of DHLs new regulations, some options may disappear altogether.
Underneath the slopes of the San Jacinto Mountains of Palm Desert, California, stands a house that looks right out of the pages of a magazine. With its distinctive rolling roof and mid-century modern design, the historic Miles C. Bates Wave House holds a coveted spot on the National Register of Historic Places.
And now, thanks to a collaboration between modern furniture-and-design company Design Within Reach (DWR) and vacation rental company, Boutique, the Wave House is beautifully furnished and open to the public for rentals.
[Photo: Courtesy Design Within Reach]
DWR chose to outfit the house with pieces from its Paul Smith Collection, a collaboration with the British luxury fashion designer releasing the same day as the house booking. True to Smiths design philosophy of classic with a twist, the collection reimagines a selection of iconic Knoll, Herman Miller, and DWR furniture with colorful new textiles. From the Eames Molded Plastic Side Chair refreshed with a seat cushion fashioned in lime green polka dots to Eero Saarinens Womb Chair cheerfully covered in vertical stripes, the collection aims to strike a balance between modernity and tradition.
[Photo: Courtesy Design Within Reach]
The collaboration provides an opportunity for DWR to explore new ways to introduce their collections to audiences. Debbie Propst, president of global retail at DWRs parent company MillerKnoll, notes that this is an exciting opportunity to allow people to live with DWR pieces in real life and interact with them outside of a store.
[Photo: courtesy Design Within Reach]
This experiential marketing philosophy isn’t new. The shoppable hotel room phenomena has been rising in popularity as a way to entice guests to bring a piece of their vacation back home with them. Guests at the Wave House can purchase everything from side chairs to the bed frame. All of the pieces in the collection are available through DWR’s website and at its new nearby Palm Springs location, opened just this February.
[Photo: Courtesy Design Within Reach]
When planning the furnishings for the house, Omar Nobil, senior vice president and creative director at DWR, says that the companys goal was to embody the spirit of the property and create a transportive experience for guests.
[Photo: Courtesy Design Within Reach]
The striking architecture is a perfect home to the collection which honors form and function through bold applications of pattern, color, and scale, says Nobil. Great interior design has the power to move and inspire people when every detail, large or small, has been considered with the purpose of creating a particular, transportive experience.
