Hi friends! Today we’re kicking off a new series. One of the most fun and fabulous parts of our job is the opportunity we get to discover emerging brands and meet the creatives behind the beauty. To share this with you, we’ll be featuring our favorite young brands here on the blog. In addition to that, through a series of trunk shows, permanent in-store features, and co-branded product collaborations, we will introduce you in-person to the designers and let you shop unique products.
We’re starting this all off with a spotlight on Forsyth, a St. Louis-based hide business spearheaded by a team of twin sisters, Annie & Maggie Genovese, along with John O’Hara and Christina’s sister-in-law, Kelly Bryant. This brand, whose beautiful pieces claim celeb fans including Diane von Fürstenberg and Jessica Simpson, started off with a simple product – zebra and cow hides. They have since expanded to sheepskin rugs, hide pillows and art objects, and hide-upholstered antiques.
Their nostalgic brand aesthetic along with their high standard and responsible approach to procuring exotic luxuries from abroad made us early followers and customers. We love to pair their work with ours, so we’re opening our flagship store doors to them so you can shop their work – hides, pillows, and furniture – in St. Frank for the next 6 months (or more). Below is a look at their fabulous offices and pristine warehouse spotted with St. Frank pieces (we’re blushing!). And also a peek at some of the divine Forsyth furniture we’ll have on the floor at launch next week.
More on the brand: Forsyth is working with three materials – zebra hide, cowhide, and sheepskin. Forsyth’s zebra hides are South African Burchell zebra – a prolific population spread throughout the open savannas of southeastern Africa. Forsyth works with large, sustainable game ranches licensed to cull a number of zebras for population control (yes, akin to our deer hunting season). Forsyth also carries the finest Brazilian cowhides, known as the best hair-on cowhides in the world and procured by one of the finest tanneries on earth. Each hide was hand-selected by the Forsyth design team and meets the highest standards of hair quality, coloring, tanning excellence, and size. These same principles are applied to their incredibly soft New Zealand sheepskins. All of these pieces are 100% natural and unlined. The tanning process leaves the hides incredibly soft, allowing them to lay perfectly flat (no rug pad required!).
The welcoming entrance area of Forsyth’s St. Louis showroom.
A St. Frank Organic Indigo mini among other rustic finds.
A dazzling dining table looking into their offices.
Hide pillows mixed with patterned textiles.
St. Frank’s Blue Otomí in the Forsyth offices next to a chic hide-covered chair and a floor layered in rugs.
The warehouse. WOW.
Each Forsyth hide is unique – named and numbered.
A vintage Chinese Art Deco bench: red lacquer plus speckled cowhide equals bliss! Shop this at St. Frank.
Brno chairs by Mies van der Rohe for Knoll with a light palomino cowhide. Swooning! Also in our store.
You know you need to visit us to sit in these heavenly Edward Wormley for Dunbar armchairs upholstered in luxurious sheepskin.
