Back from my trip to Germany for Duravit’s 2009 Design Days at their Black Forest headquarters in Hornberg Germany. It was a truly international event with press represented from countries around the world. 

New products, new processes and pretzel bread as far as the eye could see.

A whirlwind trip to various Duravit and Hansgrohe hot spots in the Black Forest, the two companies displayed their ongoing partnership by holding their industry events, Design Days and Hansgrohe’s VIP Forum, concurrently.

At the Aquademie, Hansgrohe’s training center and seminar space (it also houses its Showerworld, which is exactly what it sounds like), your faithful green editor and some industry colleagues got a demonstration of various Hansgrohe products and had the opportunity to ask all kinds of water related questions, straight from the R & D fellows who design the products.

One truly surprising thing I learned during that session was that Europeans care far less about water conservation than I think many of sitting in on the demonstration would have imagined!  The experts told us that they design products of a certain gallons-per-minute rating (or litres, rather) for the EU, and then have to cut that flow down to our standard 1.6 gpm (or lower, depending on the product) for the U.S. market.  That, for Europeans, green means a different set of priorities, and water conservation is relatively low on that list at the moment. For once, the U.S. is driving the fashion trends for the Europeans.

Duravit announced a new series in conjunction with Hansgrohe, the Pura Vida, which will be launched later this year.

But the big news from Duravit has the company going in a few different directions including a new steam unit, therapeutic tubs, and a new sink from Philippe Starck.

What’s so new about it?  (more…)