Lookbook: Cork Upholstery

Being ​“one with the nat­ur­al world” is, for most, a con­di­tion of well­ness. We seek to lessen our envi­ron­men­tal impact by har­vest­ing earth’s pre­cious resources wise­ly and assess­ing the life cycles of what we take. With sus­tain­abil­i­ty a pri­or­i­ty, Wolf-Gor­don is intro­duc­ing five new uphol­stery tex­tiles made of beau­ti­ful, biodegrad­able and renew­able cork. The inher­ent­ly flame-resis­tant mate­r­i­al can also be used as a wall covering.

How is our cork uphol­stery made?

1. Cork is stripped from the bark of a ​“live” cork oak tree, which regen­er­ates every 9 – 10 years, main­tain­ing the forest’s eco­log­i­cal process.
2. Cork bark planks are col­lect­ed and tak­en to a pro­cess­ing plant where the cork is air dried for approx­i­mate­ly six weeks.
3. The planks are boiled to remove the rough out­er lay­er and clean and soft­en the mate­r­i­al. The bark is then shaved into very thin sheets.
4. Pieces of the sheets are arranged to cre­ate the var­i­ous pat­terns, which may be backed with col­or or metal­lic sheets and bond­ed to a polyester/​cotton back­ing. The cork can then be stained or col­ored.

Where does our cork come from?

Cork oak trees grow nat­u­ral­ly in two areas of the world: South­west Europe and North­west Africa. Our cork prod­ucts come from Por­tu­gal and Spain, where laws pro­tect thou­sands of acres of for­est and, in turn, pro­tect hun­dreds of species of birds, ani­mals, and plants. Por­tu­gal pro­duces more than 50% of the world’s cork sup­ply. It is also the loca­tion of the world’s old­est demar­cat­ed wine region, the Douro Val­ley, renowned for its port wine.

What are oth­er uses for cork?

Of course, the most icon­ic use for cork is asso­ci­at­ed with stop­pers for wine and cham­pagne bot­tles. How­ev­er, the soft, durable, and ani­mal-friend­ly mate­r­i­al has also been used in place of leather for hand­bags, shoes, hats, and oth­er fash­ion acces­sories. Por­tugese archi­tects such as Álvaro Siza and Eduar­do Souto de Moura have designed fur­ni­ture, inte­ri­or fix­tures, and even build­ings cov­ered with cork cladding.