Gorder Joins With Team Extreme

New York —Television makeover specialist Genevieve Gorder has teamed with Extreme Linen to launch a home textiles line.

Gorder — known for her turns on cable channel TLC's “Trading Spaces” and “Town Haul” programs — wants to create a solutions-oriented line of products, she said. Her inaugural launch with Extreme Linen will consist of a unique window covering debuting at the supplier's showroom during the New York Home Textiles Market. Other product categories are expected to debut during the fall market.

“Most of our population in this country lives in suburban communities in new or newer homes. Many of those windows need a custom fit,” said Gorder, who earned her BFA in graphic design from Manhattan's School of Visual Arts and worked in corporate packaging, fashion and product development before launching into television.

Although the precise nature of the window introduction remains under wraps until market, she said the new product will offer a custom fit “but function at a more affordable price.” She added, “I'm sick of looking at blinds.”

Extreme Linen is the finished product offshoot of fabric supplier Jtex that positions itself as a customer-specific product-development resource for the television shopping, dot-com and national retail-chain channels. Its signature introduction during the 2004 fall market was room-in-a-box, which included not only a comforter/sheet set ensemble but also a coordinating picture frame, tissue box, window panel, flip valence and curtain rod.

The company has recently expanded its design team to four people and expanded its New York offices and showroom space at 25 W. 36th St.

The new Gorder brand — not yet named — will target 18- to 35-year-olds, according to Extreme Linen's Mesh Gelman, vice president of global sourcing.

He sees Gorder as a cross between Martha Stewart and Oprah Winfrey, a combination of trusted taste-marker and friendly advice-giver for the masses.

“Her goal is ultimately to use the TV community as a platform,” Gelman said. “We think it could be very big.”

Gorder said she would like to emulate the Stewart brand strategy: creating specific grades of product targeting various retail channels. She has also struck a deal with Flor, a maker of modular carpet systems, to create flexible flooring that can be assembled as area rugs or wall-to-wall carpeting.

Her New York-based company, GG Studios, is also working on projects involving kitchen appliances, blue jeans, greeting cards and re-designing Tanguerey bottles. Her current sponsors include Proctor & Gamble's Swiffer line and 3M's painters tape.

“It's all part of my 100-year plan,” she laughed.

Television, she added, can be fleeting, “but I'll never give up on design.”