Coverings, the largest tile and stone trade show in North America, has announced the winners of its prestigious 2021 Rock Star awards. The Coverings Rock Star award is an Emerging Leaders Program that honors the best and brightest young talent in the tile and stone industry. Among this year’s winners is Jennifer Diliberto Riquelme, a Senior Development Chemist with MAPEI.

A graduate of the University of Miami with a BA in chemistry and a BS in science and an expert in color science, Diliberto Riquelme specializes in color development in MAPEI’s Research and Development labratories. It is safe to say that if a product involves color at MAPEI, it also involves Diliberto Riquelme. During her 10 years at MAPEI, she has managed all of the color development of the CQ aggregates that are instrumental to the Flexcolor CQ, Kerapoxy CQ, and Kerapoxy IEG CQ lines of grout. She also performed the original color development work for the Elastocolor line. She worked to bring Ultracolor Plus FA and Ultracolor Plus MAX to the market, as well as Keracolor S and Keracolor U. She also manages the color development for the matching sealants, Keracaulk S, Keracaulk U, and Mapesil T Plus.

All of this lab work results in very popular products, however, there is one project that Diliberto Riquelme gives special mention. “I did all of the color development across all product lines (cementitious, epoxy, acrylic, and coatings) that offere the 15 new colors (#101 to 115), as well as the custom color matching of any cementitious gout, including in the TWA terminal in JFK airport and in the new Terminal B in La Guardia airport,” Diliberto Riquelme said.

The Rock Star winners will be recognized at an awards reception on Wednesday, July 7 during Coverings 2021, taking place July 7-9, 2021, in Orlando, Florida. The honorees will also receive a gift card and will be honored with an onsite luncheon.

Congratulations to all of the 2021 Rock Star recipients: TBD

To learn more about the Coverings 2021 Rock Stars, visit www.coverings.com/coverings-rock-stars. For more information about the Coverings Connected digital experience and to view the schedule, visit www.coverings.com.