Contract Furniture Review: Fortune Phoenix
Tuesday, December 4th, 2007Fortune Phoenix put out a press release, so I trotted over to their web site to have a look around. This Australian company specializes in hotel furniture and other commercial furniture, often pairing with hotel owners, architects, and interior designers to come up with unique solutions.
I must say, some of the photos on their web site are impressive. Fortune Phoenix also specializes in ornate carvings and inlays for panels, and those carvings and inlays look great. Check out the photo of this lion head carving. It looks like something Indiana Jones would find and try to abscond with before being captured and tossed into a snake pit by his enemies. I really like it. Some of the multi-hued wooden inlays remind me of Moroccan decor, and there’s even one collection of chairs carved so gracefully that they look like something belonging to the elves from Lord of the Rings. They would make the most fantastic bistro area chairs. (You know, if the elves ran a bistro. Hey, a woman can dream!)
What I don’t like is the lack of information on the web site itself. Someone obviously took a lot of time putting together the photos and Flash display, but the descriptive and informative text is minimal. I understand that most of their type of business is done through inquiry, but most sites for commercial furniture manufacturers include specific details about their products, even if those products can be heavily customized.
According to their directory listing, Fortune Phoenix provides “fine furniture, design and manufacturing for star hotels, resorts, serviced apartments, real estate and branded furniture.” They boast plenty of modern equipment as well as an automatic kiln drying facility to ensure a continual supply of dried timber.
My final impression is that the furniture is gorgeous, and the facilities are worth bragging about, but the company’s web site is not quite ready for prime time.
