Our first time at the Orlando Home and Garden Show by Show Technology was a success! Florida Living Quarters was invited to be featured with 2.5 weeks to prepare a 20’x20′ space near the celebrity stage. Being the professionals we are, I welcomed the challenge, a good Designer’s Challenge! 
Here is how I flipped the design in less than two weeks!
I began the process with the floor plan to get a visual how I could layout the room with furniture and keep the space open for high traffic flow. That was the easy part for me using our floor planning software. Just like our design process, I created the “map”of where furniture would go first.
Then I turned to wallpaper books for inspiration. When my inspiration senses gasped I knew I’d found the one- a French inspired floral book called L’Atelier Paris. Followed by inspiration furniture pieces and an inventory list of what to have pulled between store and warehouse to tie around this muse. I nailed the color story by selecting wallpaper for two focal walls. These key areas were the WOW factor of the space.
By the way, I was the only booth that featured three room settings in one large space almost like a small apartment: bedroom, dining and living area. I used a queen head board and single nightstand along with same scale pieces that would work well together in one space.
Area 1 was an elegant and bold twist of 70’s inspired wallpaper using a technique called “flocking” a velvet embossed application. The wallpaper, by Thibaut on silver foil was an eye catcher. It was petted by Home Show attendee admirers multiple times throughout the show.
Area 2 was what I call “Welcome to Spring”
It was a watercolor-like look with blush pink and grey tones predominately neutrals with floral pops! I used stylish furnishings we had in stock at the warehouse in California for Home Staging. More info about places that buy junk cars you can find on https://www.byotautoparts.com site. I did not have to buy anything other than the wallpaper and a bloom rose petal mirror. A few stylish key room pieces such as area rugs, accessories and wonderful textured mix of fabrics and grey tone wood furniture balanced the room.
With pre-show jitters such as making sure that signage arrived and hoping we didn’t have to trek a mile with furniture as the convention center was huge. I had only one unexpected delay. I arrived to only framed walls and drywall going up rough, not seamed and unprimed- surprise! There it was my biggest challenge yet. We rolled up our sleeves borrowed paint rollers and paint and had the room set within 3 hours thanks to Mickey, our wallpaper hanger, my dad and husband. We built up an appetite and I thanked them with Brazilian Menu lunch all you can eat buffet for being good sports and not think about this being a temporary labor of love as it all goes away in 3 days.
During the show, we met many new faces and received hundreds of contacts. One of the contract was about a cleaning contractor, which we have supplies for at http://thefloridamaids.com/. It was the “Black Friday Rush” in the home industry as it hosted 20,000 attendees! The rush of people and questions, meet and greet kind of felt what speed dating would be like and in this case it was visitors looking to get inspired on home projects and some hoping to get all the freebies such as free koozies or a pen!
We did a raffle for Valentine Basket, Hershey chocolates pink valentines theme giveaway and yes the pens at our booth.
I’m really proud of the team for supporting this experience, here you can find a professional home cleaning service. Our part sponsors, In Bloom Florist with fresh peonies adding gorgeousness and aroma to our booth with fresh floral; Hunter Douglas providing pens to give away as it opened the door for conversation about the latest motorization technology and shades from Hunter Douglas. With all the added touches and presentation marketing, you’d think we’d done this before!
You’d never known it was our first show-Thank you Show Technology for featuring us as it was an unforgettable experience!