Photo / Joanne Dugan
ABOUT:
Paula Zanger’s passion is her project, OrangeHOWELL® a design entity, inspired by philanthropy for spirited gift giving, rich with storied heritage.
Paula loves to bring beautiful design into people’s homes with her deep understanding of materials: textiles, precious metals, gemstones, leather, paper, porcelain, crystal, glass and organic sustainable concepts. Her product development skills focus on #newlocalism & #shoplocal movement for humanitarian values.
Orange Howell is Paula Zanger's great-grandfather's given name, a spirited “Seventh Son of a Seventh Son”, Welsh, Hoosier, Farmer, Quaker. Founded in 2010, OrangeHOWELL items are specifically handmade in Manhattan and New England. Clients have included Neiman Marcus, Brooks Brothers, abc home, The Daughters of the American Revolution, The Plaza Hotel, The Beverly Wilshire, The Ritz-Carlton, The Little Nell, specialty stores and fine jewelers.
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As Account Executive at Design Within Reach’s Flagship Studio on East 57th Street, New York City, Paula interfaces with interior designers and architects and their clients, to customize the iconic designs of Saarinen, Le Corbusier, Charles and Ray Eames utilizing textiles of Maharam, Knoll and Alexander Girard, former Director of Textile Design, for Herman Miller.
When Creative Director of Lunt Silversmiths, Paula strengthened the brand's perception in an attempt to innovate the 107-year-old American luxury brand to be sold to Reed & Barton. Licenses included: Oscar de la Renta, New York Botanical Garden, MFA, Boston, Disney, and Eric Carle. Lunt Silversmiths was the exclusive manufacturer of sterling silverware for U.S. Embassies around the world.
In 2007, Whole Foods Market gave Paula the opportunity to help conceptualize and research local manufacturers. The mission was to build a relevant lifestyle brand for the Organic Home sector, by combining product development and design experience with the ever “greening” societal shift. During this time Paula was also mentored by Robert Bentley, V.P. of A.G.T.A in his rarified gemstone world direct from “Mother Nature”. In 2006 she expanded Vera Wang’s dinnerware designs by extending the collections into giftware for the Wedgwood - Waterford and Vera Wang licenses.
Paula's licensed surface designs of the 1990's became multi-million selling licensed surface designs in several home and gift categories. Paula has proven retail sales of her licensed programs of $14M dinnerware, $8M wallpaper, $8M stationery. Her strength is in understanding and innovating technical production processes of manufacturers to develop beautiful innovative products encompassing dinnerware, glassware, serveware, flatware, bedding, fabrics, wallpaper, decorative pillows, and accessories.
An alumna of University of Wisconsin - Madison, Paula participated in the Human Ecology (Home Ec.!) accelerated program at the Fashion Institute of New York. After graduation she stayed in New York City, landing a position as a textile designer on "Fashion Avenue". In the mid 1980s, she opened ZAOT & SOFASOMA, a furniture / fabric boutique that refurbished found furniture and created handprinted textiles for architects and interior designers, such as Clodaugh, Eric Hilton, Lucien Rees-Roberts and Steven Harris Architects. Several collections of hand-printed pillows were designed exclusively for Barneys New York, abc home, Fellisimo, Archetype, Civilization, Ross & Williams (on St. Marks Place!) and the highly influential Furniture of the 20th Century.
Direct involvement in the academic design community has been a vital part of her design career, through teaching (RISD & Parsons School of Design), critiques (SCAD), panels (F.I.T.) and Emeritus Member, Board of Visitors of UW-Madison. Most recently, guest critic at Jefferson University’s Center of Excellence: Surface Imaging and Critic Surface Design, Wintersession 2016 at Rhode Island School of Design.
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