NeoCon 2025, held at the iconic Merchandise Mart in Chicago, the focus was not only on design, but on redefining the future of materials. Honext and Greenarea were able to present Albufera, a creation by Rafa Ortega for Greenarea, made using HONEXT® panels.
With over 50,000 designers, architects, manufacturers and specifiers attending NeoCon, the event proved to be ideal to introduce a product that fuses sustainability, innovation and art.
Contemporary craftsmanship that propose an evolution of decorative coatings that can be touched and felt. Innovative biophilic tiles designed by Rafa Ortega for Greeanarea that combine preserved lichen with HONEXT® boards.
The Future of Design is Circular - and Emotional
Rewrite: Down the Hall was a curated pop-up exhibition that brought together design proposals that reinterpret, reimagine, and reuse materials. The perfect setting to showcase a creation like Albufera.
Designed by Rafa Ortega for Greenarea, Albufera is not just a product—it is a statement of intent. Made from preserved lichens and mounted on HONEXT® panels—manufactured with residual cellulose fibers and other industrial waste—it is a 100% circular material that also meets the highest health standards. Proof of this is its Cradle to Cradle Material Health Gold certification. The result is a new line of immersive, textured walls that evoke the natural world while promoting environmental regeneration.
Albufera goes beyond conventional sustainability: it delves into emotional sustainability. Its purpose is to create spaces that people can connect with, reflecting a deeper relationship with nature. The collection is inspired by the Albufera Natural Park in Valencia, and it does more than replicate its beauty: it incorporates an ecological ethic at its very core.
From Waste to Value
A standout fact that captivated NeoCon 2025 attendees: for every 100 m2 of HONEXT® boards used in a project like Albufera, 720 kg of residual cellulose fibers and industrial waste are rescued from landfills or incineration. Instead, they are transformed into architectural materials that are not only healthy and sustainable but also aesthetically versatile and emotionally evocative.
This makes Greenarea’s collection more than just a decorative solution—it becomes a tool for storytelling. It introduces a new language of surfaces—one that invites reflection, fosters emotional connection, and elevates interior spaces into immersive narratives of sustainability and nature.
Something Greenarea knows well, as pioneers in the use of biophilia and preserved vegetation in interior design, promoting occupant health through the many benefits that contact with nature offers to our well-being.
Introducing Vareta: IfDesign Award 2025
Greenarea has also chosen HONEXT® for another of its creations, also by designer Rafa Ortega. In this case, it is Vareta, recently awarded the iF Design Award. Tradition, innovation, and circularity come together in Vareta.
This transformation uses HONEXT® material combined with plant creativity—100% natural and maintenance-free—in a cladding of organic geometries, sensations, and well-being.
Redefining building materials for a regenerative future
NeoCon 2025 confirmed what the most visionary designers and architects already suspected: sustainable design is no longer an option, it is the present and the future. There are materials like Honext that offer a real and truly circular alternative, and there are companies like Greenarea that choose materials like HONEXT® for their interior design creations, helping to promote wellbeing with creative, innovative, and sustainable biophilic solutions that are 100% natural and maintenance-free—thanks, of course, to creators like Rafa Ortega who are capable of imagining and shaping such special projects.
This collaboration reflects a broader movement in the construction and interior design industry, demanding materials that help preserve ecosystems, reduce carbon footprints, and reconnect people with nature.
