Cindy Crawford finds furniture design to her liking

When Cindy Crawford chooses furniture, she thinks like a mom.

With two kids under 10, fabrics for her home must be durable and washable and, of course, stylish, too.

So when Crawford started a furniture line for Rooms To Go about 2 1/2 years ago, she looked to her own home for inspiration.

Crawford spent five days in Naples, Fla. this week, filming commercials and promoting her furniture collections for Rooms To Go.

The line, which generates more than $100 million a year in sales, has been “very, very successful”? since it was launched in September 2005,said Jeff Seaman, Rooms To Go president, in a telephone interview.

Currently, Crawford’s collections are sold in 120 Rooms To Go stores across the country, and in early 2007 will be introduced into four other large furniture retailers.

“Working with Cindy is really a collaboration,”? Seaman said. “It’s not like when you have just a celebrity sponsor name on things. She really participates.”?

When Crawford began working with designers on her collections, she invited them to her Malibu, Calif. home to see how she lives, what type of pieces she likes and what textiles she favors. Her role is to inspire the designers, choose ideas she likes and ultimately approve materials, pieces and concepts. She also works on marketing and promotions, like her visit to Naples.

Many of the items in Crawford’s “Home and Kids”? collections were inspired by her own furniture, and in some cases, the Rooms To Go version is better, she said.

For example, take one of the beds in the Malibu collection: It is modeled after the bed in Crawford’s room, but because her kids would hit their heads on the wooden headboard, the version sold by Rooms To Go has a wood frame with an upholstered headboard.

Kids collections named after Crawford’s two children, 7-year-old Presley and 5-year-old Kaia, are inspired by Presley’s bedroom and what Crawford imagines for Kaia in the future, she said.

Presley spends a lot of his time on his bedroom floor, so to conserve that play space, Crawford chose two twin beds that hug the walls of his room. That bed has also been translated into a Rooms To Go piece.

Crawford’s home is a “no coaster household”? because she wants people “to relax and not be uptight that they’re going to ruin things,”? she said.

Strawberries and tomato sauce seem to find their way onto kitchen chairs, and so the bamboo chairs in Crawford’s kitchen have cushions with just a little bit of red in the pattern — just in case a drop of sauce or a berry should fall.

“I’ve worked with a decorator on my homes in the past, and I would always say, ”˜look, can my kid puke on this?’”? said Crawford, laughing, during a telephone interview as she drove to the airport in California.

Crawford created leather pieces, which are durable and easy to clean, and denim couches and chairs with slipcovers that are easy to remove and wash. Microfibers are good too, she said, because they feel like suede but wipe off easily.

Crawford’s Rooms To Go collections are “eclectic,”? from contemporary to traditional, said Seaman, Rooms To Go president.

The partnership with Rooms To Go began when Seaman contacted Crawford about creating a line. He had been thinking of collaborating on a line with a celebrity, and decided to ask Crawford after coming across a photo of her in an Omega advertisement.

On her first visit to a Rooms To Go store, Crawford was impressed, she said.

“I’m from the Midwest, and I did not grow up affluent at all,”? she said. “When I went into Rooms To Go it was like, this is what my mother wants, this is what my sisters want. It’s great solutions, great quality at great prices.”?

In fact, Crawford has the slipcover denim couch and chairs from her Beachside Denim collection in her Malibu home, along with a bed from the Malibu collection and various accessories. Her home in Illinois, which is right next door to her mom’s house, has even more Rooms To Go furniture because she was decorating it just after her collections launched.

It wasn’t difficult for Crawford to move from the fashion industry into designing furniture, because her style — whether it’s for clothes or food or furniture — translated and she’s always enjoyed creating homes for her family, she said.

“It’s kind of like this is my gravy at the end of my career because it’s such a great relationship,”? Crawford said. “... It’s fun for me because it is different than what I’ve done for the last 20 years.”?