A Productive Year: Licensing Program Adds Five New Partners

Fiscal Year 2022-2023 (July 1, 2022 to June 30, 2023) was productive for partnerships for the Museum of New Mexico Foundation's licensing program. Five new licensees—two with U.K. based companies—were signed to develop a wide range of products coming to market in mid-2024.

Sales of these products will add to the Foundation’s bottom line for licensing, and public relations efforts to promote these collections will expose the museums that inspired them to a broader audience. Overall, the program generated $112,000 in gross revenues during the fiscal year.

On the home décor front, we renewed a contract with Kravet fabrics, our longtime fabric licensee. After a visit to the textile collections at the Museum of International Folk Art and Museum of Indian Arts and Culture last fall, the Kravet design team identified 15 to 20 pieces that will serve as inspiration for the fifth Museum of New Mexico collection of fabrics for the home.

Hartmann & Forbes, manufacturer of handwoven window and wall coverings, expressed interest in developing a window covering collection representative of the Southwest. With this specific focus in mind, concentrating on the basketry collection at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture for inspiration made sense. The museum’s curatorial team helped identify 20 baskets, plus some pots and saddle blankets. From photographs of these items, Rebecca Welch, Hartmann & Forbes director of product development, a master weaver herself, proposed five stunning woven window covering designs. The museum team reviewed and approved them, and production has begun with plans for a spring 2023 launch.

A new furniture license rounds out our offerings. “Furniture is a challenging category as few major U.S. furniture manufacturers understand the New Mexico aesthetic,” says Pamela Kelly, the Foundation’s vice president of licensing and brand management. “We have brought five different collections to market, but always with North Carolina-based companies.”

Thanks to an introduction by Teresa Curl, the Foundation’s vice president of retail, the Foundation is partnering with the Albuquerque-based Ernest Thompson, a company steeped in New Mexico tradition. Owner Mike Godwin was drawn to the furniture collections at the New Mexico Museum of Art, specifically those pieces made for the museum in the early 1900s by Samuel F. Hudelson and Jesse Nusbaum. We are excited about this collaboration and hope to see finished products later this fall.

The final two new licensees are with U.K.-based companies: Fox & Chave, a scarf manufacturer, and Annie Sloan, a company that makes paint for the DIY market. “We are thrilled to have discovered our museum collections have international appeal,” says Kelly.

This article and image are from the Museum of New Mexico Foundation’s Member News Magazine.