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Despite pandemic challenges, last year the company celebrated its 30th anniversary but it is certainly not stuck in the past. "We are, at our core, an innovative and forward- thinking company which allows us to stand out in the furniture realm," said Lucas. With that in mind, the company looked at the world we were living in during the pandemic and saw an opportunity to jump into home office furniture. Label 180 was launched as its new home office upholstered collection that is sold directly to the consumer. "As we were all working from home, sitting at a kitchen table, we started thinking about the idea of working from home and how we believed there was going to be some permanent shift towards this. How could we change how you work from home," said Lucas. The end result is a customizable line of upholstered and comfortable office furniture including upholstered desks that can incorporate colors, patterns or texture. "Just like we do with sofas, we encourage customers to build their desks to their own size and with their own color choice. We wanted to flip the whole category of office furniture on its head," Lucas said. The Label 180 collection is a separate entity from American Leather but builds upon the strengths the latter company has created through time. Additionally Label 180 gives back via the non-profit 1% for the Planet on all purchases. No company excels without good leaders and Lucas has provided that leadership for the past several years. She is no stranger to the world of textiles, having started her career with companies such as Reebok, and Chico's before transitioning to furniture. She said the transition from footwear to furniture was easy because she sees the products as similar in many ways. Both are design and personal product purchases that carry an emotional aspect. "There's a lot of emotion in buying furniture for your home. It will be on display for family and friends, and something you live with every day. It's a much more permanent purchase than a pair of shoes, but both are emotional purchases," she said. "Furniture is more permanent than an accent rug and purchasing one piece is often the springboard to designing your entire home. We all want furniture to be perfect for how we live our lives." American Leather is helping us reach that perfection. www.americanleather.com V U E N J .C O M 57

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