Our Mission

The American Home Furnishings Hall of Fame Foundation, Inc., is an industry-wide organization founded to preserve its history, to celebrate exceptional individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to the U.S. home furnishings industry, to inspire the next generation of innovative leaders and to engage the community with the world of home furnishings. 

Our History

The American Home Furnishings Hall of Fame Foundation, Inc. was founded on February 22, 1988 by a group of executives who recognized the need to preserve the heritage of the home furnishings industry and to honor its leaders. As an international, industry-wide organization, our mission is three-fold: we honor our leaders, tell our story and inspire a new class of leaders.  Amazingly, there was no written history of our industry until the Hall of Fame fastidiously started compiling a timeline history of our cultural, economic and artistic development in the United States.  Our growing collection of historical memorabilia includes documents, photographs, objects, and a library of books. We honor our leaders through induction into the American Home Furnishings Hall of Fame, the industry’s highest honor. The annual Induction Celebration held each October includes a gathering of more than 1,200, a Pinning Ceremony at the Wall of Fame and installation of a permanent brick in the Walk of Fame.  As an integral part of our history initiative, inductees are invited to share their stories in an extensive oral interview, which is conducted, edited, and published by the Hall of Fame. This initiative forms part of a broader "Tell Us Your Story" project, which seeks to preserve the history of the industry at all levels, across all facets, and through multiple mediums. The third part of our mission is to inspire a new class of innovation and leadership. Each year, we introduce the industry to a world-class speaker and recognize 5 Future Leaders. These promising young leaders engage in small one-on-one dinner discussions with inducted members of the Hall of Fame and are encouraged to connect with each other. Our new permanent home will be a place to gather, to teach and to inspire.  We have engaged a leading exhibit design firm to help us cultivate a series of informative exhibits about the history and future of the home furnishings industry so that when people visit High Point and say, "I want to see the Home Furnishings Capital of the World," our city will have a world-class destination to tell the High Point Market story.  It includes a stunning Celebration Hall complete with a massive Story Wall that can accommodate large public gatherings, meetings and celebrations of special life events, and a tech-savvy executive boardroom for 50 people.  Our new home will embrace High Point citizens, the industry and other business or touring visitors. 

Each year, three to five individuals whose leadership and outstanding achievements have contributed to the innovation and development of the U.S. home furnishings industry are awarded the industry’s highest honor: induction into the American Home Furnishings Hall of Fame.  The world-class, industry-wide celebration is held during the High Point Market, starting with the Pinning Ceremony when Hall of Fame members present a gold, black enamel and diamond lapel pin to the new inductees.  The ceremony also includes the unveiling of their new entry onto the Wall of Fame display, “The Innovation of Our Leaders”, as well as the placement of a permanent brick in the Walk of Fame.