Gemma Seating Family | Herman Miller
Herman Miller recently unveiled a new Fulton Market showroom and interactive seating lab during Design Days, which took place concurrently with NeoCon 2025 in Chicago. There, Herman Miller introduced the Gemma Seating Family and enhancements to the Mora System.
The Gemma Seating Family aims to meet the needs of individuals within healthcare settings. The collection includes the Gemma Recliner, Sleep Chair, Flop Sofa, and Double Sleep Sofa. With its modern aesthetic and intuitive, easy-to-use mechanisms, Gemma aims to create an environment that helps ease the stress that patients and caregivers may feel.
Each seating type was designed to “feel familiar,” allowing individuals to easily maneuver to suit their needs. An optional adjustable tray table can be used for reading, using a laptop, or eating. A pull-tab also helps transition the Gemma Sleep Chair and Gemma Double Sleep Sofa for sleeping.
With three recliner sizes, a sleep chair, and two types of sleep sofas, this collection aims to combine comfort and style and features a range of leg options including standard 5” casters which provide the versatility to adapt to various room sizes and settings across consult, patient, respite, and waiting rooms.
Ellie | Kwalu
Industrial designer Von Robinson of Play Orbit Studio has teamed up with healthcare furnishing leader, Kwalu, to debut the Ellie Collection, a seating series created to inspire healing and connection in healthcare spaces.
Ellie, which launched at NeoCon 2025 in the Kwalu Showroom, marks an evolution in Robinson’s exploration of biophilic strategies that nurture holistic wellness in the built environment. As a result, the new patient recliner and sleeper sofa use a biophilic design language grounded in neuroaesthetics to soothe the brain’s amygdala, lower stress, boost mood, reduce heart rate, inspire action, and more.
“Thoughtfully designed using natural forms, materials, and rhythms, Ellie humanizes the patient experience, softening cold, harsh clinical spaces by addressing holistic well-being,” said Robinson. “With Ellie, we used a lot of curves — we’re made of curves, nature’s made of curves, and curves help healing — so we sought to establish this nonverbal communication between the person and the object. Ellie reinforces the idea that beauty and form are not a luxury, but a therapeutic imperative.”
Drawing on his experience as principal designer at Steelcase Health, where he specialized in sensing technologies and human-object interaction, Robinson brings a deep understanding of the nuances of care environments. Ellie reflects this through a non-medical aesthetic that reduces anxiety and improves cognitive function, while also supporting patient autonomy, caregiver ease, and more meaningful interaction between care partners.
