[HN Gopher] Why are most sofas so bad?
___________________________________________________________________
Why are most sofas so bad?
Author : jtsnow
Score : 724 points
Date : 2024-03-14 16:57 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.dwell.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.dwell.com)
| uoaei wrote:
| "Most important piece of furniture" is a heavily loaded
| ideological claim. It points to the rampant American culture
| surrounding media consumption.
|
| I've been pretty stunned during my travels to find that it's
| really only Americans who obsessively talk about or reference TV
| shows and movies in their small talk. No other culture seems
| nearly as interested, and some actively discourage it in favor of
| more real, personal topics. It's one of those things where once
| you start noticing it, it just gets cringier and cringier.
|
| Not everyone lives in sitcoms or spends all their free time
| watching TV...
|
| The only time I'm on my couch is when I have a few people over.
| And even then we're usually doing other things than just lazing
| about.
| gumby wrote:
| I'm not sure this is really sofa-related, but...
|
| > I've been pretty stunned during my travels to find that it's
| really only Americans who obsessively talk about or reference
| TV shows and movies in their small talk.
|
| It's a slight exaggeration, but yeah. I've really started
| noticing it on HN and some news-ish sites too, over the past
| couple of years: where a book would normally be used as a
| reference point, now a film is more commonly used instead.
| tomrod wrote:
| Weird, I saw similar conversations in SE Asia many years ago,
| especially around popular soap operas.
|
| Maybe it's hindsight bias on one of our parts.
| vundercind wrote:
| Adult Americans read so few books per year, on average, that
| it's barely an exaggeration to assert that we don't read
| books at all. And most of what we do read is romance novels
| or juvenile fiction. Been like that for a while.
| gumby wrote:
| I tried to look this up but the numbers on different sites
| were all over the place.
| saurik wrote:
| > The only time I'm on my couch is when I have a few people
| over.
|
| You make it sound like this is not merely a rare thing for you,
| but that it should be rare... I don't just passively sit and
| watch much television and yet I have spent an incredible amount
| of time in my life sitting on either my couch or the couch of a
| friend -- or even one of many couches at an office -- talking
| and laughing and having fun with other human beings. If I had
| to choose only one: a couch or a dining table, I'd go with a
| couch. Now... bed? That's harder for me, but I can totally see
| people deciding couch (as you can sleep on the couch but it is
| awkward as hell to invite people over and only have a bed to
| use).
| uoaei wrote:
| No, it's just that most activities in my home are not
| amenable to sitting.
|
| For instance, people come by all the time to play pool. Does
| that mean I should advocate that pool tables are important
| things to have in the home?
| maximinus_thrax wrote:
| > Does that mean I should advocate that pool tables are
| important things to have in the home?
|
| Yes. Write your own Dwell magazine and advocate for
| whatever you wish.
| OkayPhysicist wrote:
| And while 2-4 people are playing pool, where's everybody
| else? On various sitting furniture. I think we need to go
| one step further, and revive the conversation pit. (aka,
| the supercouch)
| IggleSniggle wrote:
| Fully agree! The sectional is a cop-out. Commit!
| pdabbadabba wrote:
| > "Most important piece of furniture" is a heavily loaded
| ideological claim. It points to the rampant American culture
| surrounding media consumption.
|
| I think you may be engaging in a bit of axe grinding here! I
| agree that the sofa is one of the post important pieces of
| furniture in my home [1], but for reasons that have nothing to
| do with television. There is no TV in the room! But it is still
| where I spend the most time sitting during downtime, reading
| books, talking to my family, etc. And when I have friends over,
| we're either there or at the dining room table.
|
| [1] For the title of _the_ most important, I might have picked
| my bed. But that 's a quibble.
| barbazoo wrote:
| > "Most important piece of furniture" is a heavily loaded
| ideological claim. It points to the rampant American culture
| surrounding media consumption.
|
| That's quite a leap. Did you consider that dwell.com might not
| have actually done a study on what Americans consider the "most
| important piece of furniture" but just used that phrase to
| justify the very existence of their article?
| uoaei wrote:
| I'm not making any claims about the preferences of Americans
| but about the default assumptions of the authors. It is as
| good a reflection of cultural attitudes as any.
| ed_blackburn wrote:
| I'm not American. But I feel seen(!) :)
| tqi wrote:
| > really only Americans who obsessively talk about or reference
| TV shows and movies in their small talk
|
| For one, it doesnt seem like americans are significant outliers
| in tv consumption[1] or smartphone usage[2]. For another, yeah
| if you're a foreign traveller people probably aren't going to
| make small talk with you about TV or other pop culture...
|
| [1]https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/which-country-watches-
| th...
|
| [2] https://explodingtopics.com/blog/smartphone-usage-
| stats#smar...
| uoaei wrote:
| I'm not speaking to consumption, I'm speaking to small talk.
| There's no good reason to believe there's a tight correlation
| there.
|
| Americans constantly shove TV into the conversation even if
| they don't know that the other person or people are familiar
| with it. Though many are aware of American media output by
| virtue of the cultural colonialism enacted since brute force
| fell out of fashion. Even if they're not explicitly speaking
| _about_ TV they 're still doing the IRL version of posting
| reaction GIFs by quoting memes in response to earnest
| conversation.
| tqi wrote:
| > There's no good reason to believe there's a tight
| correlation there.
|
| You don't think there is a strong correlation between how
| people spend their time and what they talk about?
| swatcoder wrote:
| Not to interrupt your principled tirade against lazy Americans
| or whatever, but it's not a "claim", let alone an ideological
| one. It's just a bog standard literary device for framing a
| puff piece.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| Telenovelas would seem to be a strong counterpoint to the idea
| that it's only Americans who talk about TV.
|
| If anything, TV has become dramatically less of a shared
| cultural experience for Americans since the post-network era
| began.
| com2kid wrote:
| > "Most important piece of furniture" is a heavily loaded
| ideological claim. It points to the rampant American culture
| surrounding media consumption.
|
| My family doesn't watch TV. I purchased my sofa when I didn't
| even have a TV.
|
| The most important aspect of my living room arrangement is how
| well it facilitates long, deep, conversations with friends who
| come over for visits.
|
| I have 3 pieces of seating in my living room, a chair for
| reading placed next to a book case (large enough that a couple
| small kids can sit in the lap of an adult who is reading with
| them if so desired), a smaller 2 person sofa, and a larger 6ft
| long sofa.
|
| I know plenty of other families who have similar arrangements
| with sofas so placed as to emphasize socialization with
| friends.
|
| Now if we are talking about the 90s and early 2000s, yeah, it
| was all about amazing TV watching experiences.
|
| > The only time I'm on my couch is when I have a few people
| over. And even then we're usually doing other things than just
| lazing about.
|
| The couch is where you retire to after dinner has been finished
| and everything cleaned away. Board games may occur in other
| rooms (depending on one's coffee table situation) the of course
| a room that is laid out for conversation is going to see the
| most use when there are people over to have a conversation
| with.
|
| FWIW now that I have a kid, I am hosting social events more
| often than ever before (watching children has a negative co-
| efficient for small values of n > 1, 3 kids are easier to watch
| than 1!), but even in my DINK life (at which point I didn't
| even own a TV), my couch got plenty of use.
| zachmu wrote:
| https://www.theonion.com/area-man-constantly-mentioning-he-d...
| nonameiguess wrote:
| Are you sure it's "Americans" or is it the Internet? Our
| experience of Americans may not be identical. Even just my co-
| workers and family seem to rarely if ever be aware of the same
| things on television I care about, granting I watch far more
| nature documentaries than anything else and had no access to
| broadcast networks until they launched streaming services in
| the last couple years since I cord cut around 2011 or so. The
| only thing from the past 15 years I can think of that seemed
| widely at least known about to most people I talked to was Game
| of Thrones, but even that was far from universal. My HVAC guy
| commented that I looked different because I had long hair and a
| ponytail the last time he saw me a few years ago and I said it
| was because I grew my hair out for Khal Drogo cosplay and he
| had no clue what I was talking about. He'd never even seen Game
| of Thrones or probably any other television. I actually
| remember that about two of my ex-girlfriend's dads from when I
| was in my early 20s. They were both small business owners and
| had no knowledge whatsoever about pop culture. They were so
| focused on their businesses that they never watched any
| television or saw any films.
|
| In any case, even though there is nothing on television I watch
| with any regularity currently, I would still rate my sofa as a
| fairly important piece of furniture. Not as important as my
| bed, but it is the largest piece of furniture and the
| centerpiece of my largest room. My kitchen/living room is open
| floor plan townhouse and I cook quite a bit, and I can't just
| stand all day, so that's where I rest, even though I'm just
| listening to music when I do so and not watching television.
| When I lay down to read a book, that's also usually where I do
| it. If I take a nap during the day, it's typically on the sofa.
| We usually eat dinner there, too, even though we're not
| watching television, just because it's more comfortable than
| any other place we have to sit. I even work from my sofa pretty
| frequently.
|
| But I've got no complaints, personally. I paid $300 or so at
| the PX when I joined the Army almost 20 years ago and bought my
| first house and still have the same sofa. It certainly didn't
| fall apart on me. It's moved with me four times. My wife and I
| debate getting a nice one but always decide not to because our
| cats are going to tear it up and puke on it all the time
| anyway.
| IggleSniggle wrote:
| Does media consumption include "conversing with guests?" The
| sofa is the place everybody goes to chat unless we're having a
| meal.
|
| Frankly, we'd probably use it a little less if our dining
| chairs were more comfortable, and I do think there's a very
| good case to be made that dining room chairs are more important
| than the sofa, but nonetheless, I really don't think a sofa is
| especially tied to TV culture in any way.
|
| If we're going to be _doing_ something rather than lazing
| around or eating, we 're not going to be in the house at all.
| Share6323 wrote:
| Are any sofa manufacturers out there that still produce good
| quality for around $1000, preferably from Europe ?
| asow92 wrote:
| $1k just ain't what it used to be. My wife and I just spent $5k
| on a sectional from West Elm a year ago and the fabric is
| already starting to pill.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| This is why I trust IKEA's price to quality ratio. I know I
| won't be getting the highest quality, but I will likely be
| getting the highest quality to price ratio.
|
| Got this one in 2016 for $1,100, and it's survived 2 kids
| with minimal pilling. It won't impress anyone, but I have no
| problem using it.
|
| https://www.ikeaddict.com/ikeapedia/en/Product/60276883/us-e.
| ..
|
| I have no way of discerning furniture/fabric quality, and no
| one offers long warranties, so I don't see a reason to spend
| more than IKEA prices.
| vundercind wrote:
| Yeah, the correct choices for furniture these days are
| basically: used (cheap if you're not buying something
| trendy like mid century modern), IKEA, or super-expensive
| really-good stuff. Anything new that's cheaper than that
| last category's usually just gonna be as bad or worse than
| IKEA, plus 1.2x-5x the price. And likely uglier.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| Oof! For $5k you could get something from Herman Miller, Hay,
| or Design Within Reach[1].
|
| [1] https://www.dwr.com/living-sofas-sectionals/quilton-
| chaise-s...
| dangus wrote:
| I think even showy luxury brands like RH do better than
| West Elm. CB2 as well, which is a slight step up from Crate
| and Barrel.
|
| West Elm and the whole Pottery Barn set of brands are just
| worse versions of Crate and Barrel, with terrible customer
| service to go with it. They had some of the most mean and
| rude customer service agents I've ever talked to. They
| acted like the store was an entirely different company,
| then the store acted like I needed to call the national
| call line. Plus, they outsource deliveries in a very
| annoying blame-shifting way.
|
| At least at RH you get a single human point of contact who
| can handle everything like a concierge experience.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| Yeah, their price point is totally baffling given the
| quality, service, and delivery issues.
| elteto wrote:
| Ironic, that same item you mention has 2 reviews (out of 3)
| complaining about worn out fabric within months. And almost
| $5k.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| Not really ironic. It's available in 10 different fabric
| options. If you're surprised that a wool/alpaca blend
| fabric isn't heard wearing, or that boucle snags easily
| then you didn't think through the purchase. I have a
| similar sofa with the Beck fabric and it's great for the
| way I use it. The flambier boucle fabric looks great, but
| as a cat owner, I'd never purchase it.
| 6510 wrote:
| You have to buy an old one and have it reanimated
| professionally.
| loloquwowndueo wrote:
| Reanimated? :)
| iamacyborg wrote:
| Buy something used on ebay. I picked up an &Tradition Cloud
| sofa on ebay a few years back for ~30% list price.
| seper8 wrote:
| Ikea. Can't beat price/quality.
| dangus wrote:
| I do agree with this. When you build them yourself and see
| the underneath of them they really aren't that awful compared
| to a store couch that is possibly using even worse
| construction techniques.
|
| The only problem I have with them is that they have almost no
| couch designs that have a more plush style. Almost all of
| them are firmer foams and just plain not appealing designs.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| Probably not for $1000.
|
| $2700 is what I got mine for. I think price might have been
| lowered to $2300 now.
|
| It's built in Poland. Solid wood with steel reinforcement in
| the form of steel tubing in places, springs, and then a pillow
| system on top of that. The firm making it is the Swedish
| company SITS.
|
| But I think one has to actually sit in a bunch of couches to
| see whether they're good.
| artimaeis wrote:
| Jumping in with the pro-IKEA crowd. I've had a KIVIK since 2017
| that has survived me, my wife, and friends incredibly well.
| It's moved with us 3 times and still is in great shape. Easily
| the best value piece of furniture currently in my home.
| petepete wrote:
| I bought two sofas from Habbio last year and am really happy
| with the purchase.
|
| They're made from recycled materials and are vegan. So far
| they've been great, and they have a 15 year guarantee, but time
| will tell.
|
| https://habbio.co.uk/
| angry_moose wrote:
| I've posted about our ~$2000 West Elm sofa that disintegrated
| within 2 years in a similar previous thread:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37393399
|
| The whole thing is just stapled together OSB.
|
| I ripped the dust cover off and added 3 new frame stretchers made
| from 2x8 construction lumber (and tied other loose joints back
| together) and its done pretty well since then:
| https://imgur.com/a/bqlLgW3 (wish I'd gotten a few more pictures,
| but I was tired by this point). Just shocking how terrible the
| construction is.
| nerdponx wrote:
| As if it wasn't bad enough that most consumer goods have
| completely bifurcated into "junk" and "luxury", now it's hard
| to even tell which products fall into which category, because
| there is so much junk now being sold as luxury.
| angry_moose wrote:
| Yeah. Even at the time we knew West Elm wasn't high end, but
| we were at least expecting decent.
|
| We know more now (and could afford better) whenever we have
| to finally replace this, but $2000 is a not-insignificant
| investment that shouldn't be a complete piece of crap.
| elteto wrote:
| My problem is that I don't even know where to buy _good_
| stuff. I don't want to pay $5k for a couch, but maybe I
| will _once_ in N years, for some large N, if I know it's
| very well made and I like the design.
|
| But I have no idea where to go for this. The overlap
| between junk and luxury is too large nowadays.
| JohnFen wrote:
| As with so many goods these days, I find that buying
| stuff made at least a couple of decades ago works best.
| It's much easier to tell the garbage from the treasure if
| you aren't buying stuff made recently.
| earleybird wrote:
| As sibling comment says: survivorship bias as a heuristic
| is useful.
| layer8 wrote:
| It's often not, because today's company is not the same
| as it was 10-20 years ago. The longer you want something
| to last, the less reliable past experience becomes.
| drchickensalad wrote:
| Aggregated reddit searches are amazing. Leads you to the
| gold mine that is american leather etc, which are often
| rebranded to more well known brands on a model by model
| basis. Lots of insiders on reddit with that info too.
| beAbU wrote:
| Maybey cynicism broke me but I find it impossible to
| trust recommendations from Reddit. It's too easy for
| these companies to pay for astroturfing these days.
|
| I've noticed a very prevalent "hail corporate" subculture
| on reddit that put me off believing anything anyone said.
| pfannkuchen wrote:
| I've had a consistently good experience with room and
| board so far and I am very anal about construction
| quality (as perceived by myself, anyway, I'm not a
| furniture expert).
| nijave wrote:
| I've had decent success with reddit r/BuyItForLife. Seems
| like mostly good recommendations and not too much
| shilling/advertising.
| porkbeer wrote:
| Bifl was taken over by advertisers years ago. I would not
| trust anything peddled there without a lot of research.
| strictnein wrote:
| West Elm's quality has definitely dropped the last 10
| years. It's still not a bad place to get things like side
| tables, but I definitely wouldn't buy any furniture there
| any more, which is too bad. We had gotten a couple of nice
| pieces there in the past, although they're now gone.
|
| For quality modern furniture, the only game in town around
| me is Room & Board. The last couch we bought there was
| ~$6k[0]. It's a lot, but we'd honestly been eyeing it for
| almost 20 years and it'll likely be something we have for
| another 20 years or more.
|
| https://www.roomandboard.com/catalog/living/sofas-and-
| lovese...
| theGnuMe wrote:
| It's even worse with carpet and carpet install. Thieves.
| throwaway14356 wrote:
| beds are the worse
| amluto wrote:
| I've had multiple fancy chairs, purchased from a famous high
| end brand with a very high end showroom in a very high end
| design center, fail very quickly. The failure was due to
| their vendor (fancy, in France) using nice solid finger
| jointed hardwood, well finished, in a place where that
| construction was completely inappropriate.
|
| High quality Scandinavian-style plywood probably would have
| lasted decades.
|
| Nice materials + pretty design does not necessarily result in
| a good product.
| plugin-baby wrote:
| Where is hardwood inappropriate? Genuinely curious to know
| gspencley wrote:
| I don't think that amluto is saying that the hardwood
| itself is inappropriate, or is necessarily ever
| inappropriate. I think they are saying that the specific
| joinery in their example was form over function, to the
| point where the joint was a critical point of failure.
|
| Having done a bit of woodworking as a hobby, I would say
| that hardwood could be inappropriate if it is used for an
| element that is purely structural, internal (and thus
| will be hidden by external features) and there are
| cheaper alternatives that are just as good, or stronger
| materials available and we are talking about a critical
| structural element.
|
| That's a pretty abstract answer but it's always going to
| depend on the specific project. Sometimes a piece of
| furniture has no hidden internal structure, or the appeal
| of the furniture is that it is all bare wood and you want
| it made entirely out of a beautiful "furniture grade"
| hardwood. For certain upholstered furniture, such as many
| sofas, using expensive materials for inner framing could
| not only be superfluous and add unnecessary cost to the
| piece, but in certain circumstances there may be better
| materials available even if you could make a perfectly
| adequate structural support that will last a lifetime
| using expensive hardwood and the right joinery for
| critical stress points.
|
| I read amulto's point as being "expensive material and
| fancy joinery doesn't matter if you have a weak design."
| amluto wrote:
| The chairs had four legs, each of which radiated out
| horizontally from a central point (they were swivel
| chairs) then turned downward to the floor. The legs were
| about 1/2" wide, maybe a bit more. They were maybe 1"
| tall (vertically in the horizontal section and
| horizontally in the vertical section).
|
| So the grain needed to run horizontally in the horizontal
| part to support the bending load. It was probably best
| for the grain to be vertical in the vertical part,
| although that was maybe less critical: that section was
| mostly in compression. It probably also looked better
| that way.
|
| In any case, the actual construction put a finger joint
| in the horizontal section just past the turn, so a tiny
| bit of vertical grain wood extended horizontally over the
| turn. And several of the legs cracked just along the side
| of the finger joint, and one failed completely after
| about a month of gentle use.
|
| The design plausibly could have worked if the joint went
| diagonally through the turn or was below it. But plywood
| is strong along both in-plane axes, and the legs could
| likely have been cut in single pieces from sheets of
| plywood with strength to spare.
|
| Attractive plywood, even from hardwood species, is
| readily available. The plies are visible along the cut
| edge, but this is actually a style people like,
| especially in Scandinavian furniture. Even IKEA sells
| some nice chairs with plywood elements, at entirely
| reasonably price points.
| TylerE wrote:
| I think he meant "place" as in literally "the location on
| the furniture" rather than the (very reasonable from
| context) interpretation I suspect we both had that it
| mean "place" in the geographic, or at least climatic
| sense. Which is itself important as certain woods deal
| with extremes of humidity better than others. In a
| temperate climate, just about any old wood will do, but
| somewhere that is very dry OR very wet, woods like
| mahogany and teak are best.
|
| Teak especially is so good at dealing with water that it
| was harvested to near extinction in the 19th century just
| to build ship's decks and cabins out of it.
| bombcar wrote:
| Plywood is amazingly structurally sound, because it's got
| grain going all which ways.
|
| Especially when thin, wood is surprisingly easy to break,
| and it doesn't handle being pulled on very well at all.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Reminds me previous sets of dinner chairs my parents had.
| Glued together. Slowly dried and then they were less than
| ideal... Even if the materials are good it means nothing if
| techniques are wrong.
| jahewson wrote:
| Finger jointed hardwood is not a nice material. It's short
| bits of knotty new-growth wood chopped up and glued back
| together.
| BizarroLand wrote:
| The glue will probably be the strongest part of it, but
| finger-jointed hardwood isn't that terrible. Any decent
| wood glue is crazy strong.
|
| The problem with knots is that they resist drilling and
| screwing. The problem with new growth is that the pith is
| the weakest part of the wood, and new growth has the most
| pith.
|
| Still, it's not a weak and terrible pos wood-like
| material like 1990's MDF, it will probably be ok for most
| uses as long as the grain direction is respected in
| regards to shear direction (typically you want the grain
| direction to run perpendicular to the shear forces) and
| everything is properly braced.
| amluto wrote:
| The piece in question involved one of the starting wood
| sections being finger jointed with the grain running
| along the joint line. It failed where the bases of the
| fingers were tangent to the grain, which seemed pretty
| predictable to me just looking at the wood.
| idiotsecant wrote:
| Sounds like someone who owns some fancy equipment but
| doesn't actually know carpentry. Strange combination in
| qa commercial product.
| amluto wrote:
| This wasn't (as far as I can tell) cheap finger jointed
| knotty wood. It was some furniture maker who thought
| "well, this part needs the grain one way and this other
| part needs the grain the other way, and I have a finger
| jointing machine, so I'll finger joint it!" Even if they
| somehow found a shop that stocked sheets of finger
| jointed wood with a 90 degree grain rotation across the
| joint, it would have been an incredibly inefficient way
| to produce the part in question.
|
| But they didn't think very hard -- see my other comment.
| I don't think a single solid piece of hardwood would have
| performed a whole lot better. Either metal reinforcement
| or plywood or much more carefully considered joinery was
| needed.
| lttlrck wrote:
| That sounds like hardboard? Hardwood is natural.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| >junk now being sold as luxury.
|
| That's always been the case though. There has always been
| junk marketing itself as "luxury" to milk the nouveau riche.
| It's not like real Coach bags utilize some magic leather that
| doesn't degrade just the same as the $200 leather purse you
| buy from a local artisan. It's not like the brick that
| Supreme sold was made of some sort of magical clay. The
| luxury purse companies don't burn their leftover product to
| protect some secret of Dr Who purses that are bigger or
| magically organized on the inside, but because the entire
| value of the brand is "I can afford this and you cannot"
|
| Luxury has ALWAYS been about signalling and displaying status
| and power. It's always about rubbing the prole's faces in
| their supposed supremacy. Remember, they have money because
| they are better than you, definitely not because there are
| systems and structures in place that make it easier to get
| rich for the already wealthy and connected.
|
| Unfortunately it seems so many people really struggle to
| understand that while quality often costs a lot, costing a
| lot does not imply quality in any way. If you can afford to
| spend oodles on marketing for your product, you probably
| aren't spending as much on quality as people assume you
| would.
| JohnFen wrote:
| This is why I differentiate between "quality" and "luxury".
| Luxury goods are very often just expensive junk that people
| buy in order to signal that they have money.
|
| Quality goods are well-designed, well-made, etc. And you
| can't be sure about quality based on price.
| nemothekid wrote:
| > _It 's not like real Coach bags utilize some magic
| leather that doesn't degrade just the same as the $200
| leather purse you buy from a local artisan._
|
| Not sure why Coach was chosen for this example - I don't
| believe they are expensive; last I checked they were in the
| range of $200-500, which doesn't seem egregious as the
| actual luxury brands (ex. Hermes, where the entry level
| bags are $4,000).
|
| That said, I feel there is a real difference in quality at
| various price points, and focusing on the material ("magic
| leather") is wrong. When I'm paying a premium I'm usually
| looking for in the dimensions of construction, and usually
| that means paying an actual professional who may charge
| $100/hr, vs 19 year old in Bangladesh. The two might be
| using the same material but the price difference comes from
| the person assembling the item.
|
| The problem is you have a ton of companies (even "luxury"
| ones), that in an attempt to juice their stock price, have
| also focused on getting costs super low and are now using
| the same factories as junk brands but just slapping their
| logo on it. Even products of the same brand can vary wildly
| in quality depending even on the year it was made.
|
| I have jackets from "luxury" brands that I bought 10 years
| ago that still look brand new for thousands of dollars (and
| probably saved money in the long run), but buying a similar
| item new or even trying to replace it is impossible.
| decafninja wrote:
| Some brands like Hermes, Rolex, etc. also require you to
| establish a "relationship" with them to acquire their
| most popular items (Birkin or Kelly bags, stainless steel
| watches). This entails a lengthy purchase history, and
| some schmoozing of your assigned sales associate doesn't
| hurt either. Unless you're some well known figure, just
| waltzing into a boutique with a suitcase full of cash
| won't get you what you want to buy on your first visit.
|
| Other brands are catching on. I hear Porsche (or at least
| some dealerships) have started gatekeeping 911s this way.
| brianwawok wrote:
| And what's funny is a budget model 3 you order online
| totally smokes the Porsche. It's really just trying to
| sell a badge not a product.
| decafninja wrote:
| With all respect, 0-60 times is not the only reason why
| you buy a Porsche.
|
| A Toyota Corolla probably ticks more boxes for the
| average person than any Porsche if cars are not your
| thing.
| VHRanger wrote:
| Typical American thinking.
|
| Your model 3 can't handle a corner. The reason car
| enthusiasts like Porsches is that they handle
| particularly well.
| imp0cat wrote:
| But that's not his point. He's right about the badge.
| decafninja wrote:
| Nope, he's not. Or at least not entirely.
|
| Even their models that share platforms with "lesser"
| brands in the corporate stable go through a lot to
| differentiate them.
|
| But if you don't care about cars or enjoy driving, then
| all of it is a moot point and probably meaningless to
| you, and you might as well enjoy a Toyota Camry and call
| it a day.
| c0pium wrote:
| ...on the straight away of lap one. The top trim model 3
| performance best time around the green hell is like 9
| minutes. There are factory Porsches that will do it in
| under 7.
|
| This is a very ironic comment to have made in a thread
| about how cheap things aren't as good as they seem once
| you look a bit deeper.
| dlp211 wrote:
| This is, and I cannot overstate this, one of the most
| ridiculous, tech bro statements I've read on here in a
| while.
| jbm wrote:
| Nothing gives me more joy than watching car geeks
| furiously posting when they see things like this. Thank
| you, I had a long day at work.
|
| Daily reminder that your "super cars" are worthless.
| Merging onto the highway is far more important than
| "winning in the corners".
| eszed wrote:
| Depends on where you drive, dude. I spend more time on
| mountain roads than highways.
|
| And, also, if you like driving, and sometimes drive for
| fun, curves are _way_ more fun than freeways. None of
| this has anything to do with supercars, either. My boring
| mom-car has more than enough power to merge safely. It 's
| (surprisingly, to most people) faster (acceleration and
| top-speed) and (impressively - ICE tech advanced so much)
| more fuel-efficient than my almost thirty year old Miata.
| But, obviously, I enjoy the latter 1000x more than the
| former.
|
| I guess this makes me a car geek. <shrug> That's fine. I
| do enjoy driving my super-basic, entry-level sportscar. I
| have less than zero interest in supercars.
| gannonburgett wrote:
| Mercedes and other manufacturers do this as well. While
| it's arguably an extreme example, you can't purchase the
| Mercedes Benz Project One hypercar unless you have a
| history of purchasing their low-volume, extremely
| expensive cars (AMG Black Series, etc).
| decafninja wrote:
| But that's, as you say, an extremely, extremely, rare
| model isn't it?
|
| A 911, even something like a GTS or Turbo, is peasant-
| class compared to that.
| doctorpangloss wrote:
| > degrade just the same as the $200 leather purse you buy
| from a local artisan.
|
| Where are there local artisans selling leather purses they
| made for $200? Are you sure you don't mean $4,000? Surely
| if you are buying a $200 hand made purse, it was made by
| hand in a low labor cost country and relabeled.
| bombcar wrote:
| https://saddlebackleather.com/everyday-purse/ is a bit
| over $200, and doesn't hide that it's made in Mexico
| (though they do use machines and tooling to process the
| leather so perhaps it's not "hand made").
| ghaff wrote:
| I don't have a purse. (Well, I have something from
| Mountainsmith I've had for decades that a friend calls a
| man purse. I'm sure it's been in dozens of countries.)
| But I have a front-pocket wallet/business card holder
| from Saddlebackleather that wasn't particularly expensive
| and will probably last as long as I need it to unless I
| lose it.
| tiltowait wrote:
| I've got one of their backpacks. It's very nice. Heavy,
| though, at around five pounds. Sadly it almost never gets
| any use, because I rarely have need for a backpack. I
| should have bought some luggage instead.
|
| Like the other poster, I also have a couple of their
| wallets. They're simple but obviously high quality. They
| don't feel as slick as the Coach wallet I was given as a
| gift, but I have no doubt they will hold up longer.
| ghaff wrote:
| Leather is actually not a great material for a backpack
| or an outdoor (non-dressy) shoulder bag from a practical
| perspective in the 21st century. Nylon and related
| synthetics is a lot more practical. If you gave me a
| leather outdoor bag I'd probably thank you nicely and
| stick it in a closet or sell it.
|
| I do like leather wallets though I almost exclusively use
| small front pocket ones these days because of sciatica
| and minimal needs for carrying either cash or a lot of
| cards.
| TylerE wrote:
| Going from a trifold to a bifold is pretty game changing
| if you haven't. Drastically reduced thickness for a very
| minimal change in capacity.
| bombcar wrote:
| I moved to a bifold front-carry and will never go back,
| sitting on a wallet is such a recipe for disaster.
| TylerE wrote:
| Yeah, I've never, ever understood why anyone would want
| to do that.
| ghaff wrote:
| People used to tend to carry more. Cash, membership
| cards, etc. There was even a Seinfeld episode on the
| theme.
| TylerE wrote:
| The front pocket bifold I carry has room for several
| hundred dollars in cash, and at least 8 credit card sized
| objects (and could easily hold 2 or 3x that if you didn't
| mind stacking the less frequently used ones, not counting
| my ID. How much are these people carrying?
| ghaff wrote:
| People also probably used to be more fashion-conscious
| with having even relatively bulky bifold wallets in their
| front pockets. I carry basically a business card holder
| with significantly less on a day-to-day basis. Maybe $40
| and likely about half a dozen credit card sized object
| things.
|
| I carry a travel folder when I travel but my actual
| wallet is pretty minimalist. (Though just a phone
| wallet/pocket doesn't work for me. The Apple magnetic
| wallet I bought which I was also uncomfortable with
| depending on was 3 cards--no more, no less.
| MrDresden wrote:
| I can second SaddlebackLeather. Have a few items from
| them and the care taken with the design, in addition to
| the materials used, tells me these items will last a long
| time.
|
| Plan on adding to the collection over time.
| littlelady wrote:
| Some years ago I found a leatherworker, who sells simple
| handbags/clutches starting at about 300 EUR. He also
| sells wallets and belts. He has a limited selection of
| styles, but they are made-to-order thus you can select
| the colors when you place your order.
|
| He isn't local to me, but I've met him and watched him
| stitch his bags together and chatted about his style
| (minimalist, sleek). I couldn't afford anything from him
| at the time (his smaller items were sold out), but kept
| his card handy. I'll provide a link, in case anyone is
| interested.
|
| http://www.foerster-taschen.de/
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| I've just looked at his web site. Beautiful understated
| pieces and very good prices for the materials and the
| amount of work. Some of the handbags are under 150 EUR.
| littlelady wrote:
| That's true! I am just a bigger fan of the pieces made
| with stiffer leather, which are more expensive.
| jerkstate wrote:
| Coach is probably a bad example here because they are known
| for using high quality leather, and they are also among the
| less expensive "designer" brands (there are Coach leather
| purses in the $200-500 range, wheras you are looking at
| $2000-5000 for a brand like Louis Vuitton - also high
| quality leather, but not worlds apart from Coach). There is
| a _huge_ amount of variability in quality of leather, from
| top grain to full grain to split grain, to "genuine" and
| "bonded."
|
| In general though I agree with your point that it's
| possible to get the same quality as a luxury brand for
| cheaper, and luxury brands are about signalling, but it's a
| continuum. There are also plenty of "luxury" bag brands in
| the $200-500 range that use crummy leather and you'd be way
| better off with Coach (or a local artisan like you
| mentioned.)
| TylerE wrote:
| The most important thing to remember that the strongest
| thing they can say about genuine leather is that it isn't
| fake. Even that's debatable.
| gerdesj wrote:
| I recently visited Hong Kong. In a mall I spotted a shop
| called Sinequanone (sic). It was flogging "French fashion",
| quite pricy "French fashion". Who knows, it might be French
| inspired. You can tell its authentic French thanks to the e
| acute and the trailing e!
|
| Sine qua non is Latin.
|
| To be fair, the quality did look pretty decent but marketing
| needs to try harder. Mind you that's not the daftest brand
| name or trademark ever! Who could forget the Rolls Royce
| Silver Mist? Mist in German means dung, manure or shit.
| Someone thankfully noticed before it was released (Frankfurt
| motor show) and it became the Silver Shadow. Then there was
| "Consignia" ...
| Terr_ wrote:
| > To be fair, the quality did look pretty decent but
| marketing needs to try harder.
|
| When I lived in Hong Kong, I once saw a boutique grocery
| store that had a wooden hanging-sign/plaque, and IIRC it
| was 1997 and the sign said "Since 1996."
|
| Far more amusing were the businesses non-ironically
| translated as things like "1000 Golden Fortune"-something-
| or-other.
| gerdesj wrote:
| "1000 Golden Fortune" or Jolly good luck ... something. I
| think that's fair enough - translation of idioms is very
| hard when the languages are so far apart.
|
| There's quite a lot of history involved too so that I
| suspect there are routine translations between the
| various Chinese languages eg Cantonese and Mandarin to
| English which might be a bit behind the times but they
| still work despite sounding a bit twee nowadays to the
| relevant ears.
|
| I say: "viva la difference".
| baud147258 wrote:
| > Mind you that's not the daftest brand name or trademark
| ever!
|
| Here in France, the daftest I've seen is the Audi e-tron,
| with etron meaning turd... Though it's been out of common
| use, so Audi just left the name as is.
| martopix wrote:
| I remember an app that was a calculator where you could
| pen-in your calculations, so it was called Ink-ulator.
|
| They later changed the name profusely apologizing to
| Italian users.
| malka wrote:
| https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin%C3%A9quanone
|
| The brand actually existed.
| eightysixfour wrote:
| Luxury does not have to be premium or vice versa. Premium
| conveys quality, luxury conveys status.
| thfuran wrote:
| Luxury implies comfort or quality.
| eightysixfour wrote:
| Quality is not necessary for a good to be a luxury good.
| Only for demand to go up disproportionately with
| increases in income. Practically this means luxury goods
| are purchased to convey status. Consider Range Rover or
| Jaguar, which are known for being low quality but luxury
| brands.
|
| Premium is the word that means paying extra for an
| increase in quality. Consider a Toyota vs a Kia.
|
| These things are often correlated but don't have to be.
| thfuran wrote:
| >Only for demand to go up disproportionately with
| increases in income
|
| Okay, if we want to limit ourselves to economics jargon
| rather than vernacular.
|
| >Practically this means luxury goods are purchased to
| convey status
|
| No, practically it means poor people aren't buying them
| much. Only some luxury good purchasing is related to
| status signaling.
|
| >Premium is the word that means paying extra for an
| increase in quality
|
| I'm not aware of a context where that would be the
| standard definition, though in some contexts it may be
| the excess portion of the price.
| eightysixfour wrote:
| I don't know what to tell you for you to believe me but
| premium relating to quality and luxury relating to status
| are literally the way they're defined in the retail goods
| and brand world.
|
| https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/difference-between-
| premium-lu...
|
| https://medium.com/swlh/dont-confuse-luxury-with-
| premium-8-k...
|
| https://imgmodelsblog.com/luxury-and-premium-comparison
|
| Or, if you want to listen to techies talk about it,
| listen to this episode of Acquired:
| https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/lvmh
| m463 wrote:
| the one that gets me (not furniture, but consumer good) is
| Yeti.
|
| they seem to be slightly better made, but for SO MUCH more
| money. They have huge stores devoted to their products. Are
| people really spending money, and that much, on coolers?
| Solvency wrote:
| if you're a wealthy kid going to a beach bbq with your
| wealthy friends, yes. you signal to others your class
| through products like yeti.
|
| replace your entire question with Apple and you'll see the
| answer as a pattern.
| strictnein wrote:
| We have a couple of Yeti coolers. They work really well,
| but they're heavy and have significantly less space inside
| than you'd expect by looking at them. Most importantly
| though, they look cool and have nice shiny and colorful
| exteriors.
| pyb wrote:
| West Elm has a bit of a reputation in that regard
| some-guy wrote:
| I don't live in the Bay Area anymore, but once great thing
| about living there was the amount of secondhand West Elm /
| Williams Sonoma furniture for reasonable prices that you
| could buy from rich people. Most of their quality is a
| crapshoot but at the right price you can find good deals for
| some of their items.
| schneems wrote:
| About 8 or so years ago my wife and I were really excited to
| buy our first "adult" piece of furniture (read, not-ikea). And
| we found a leather sofa we loved the look of at West Elm. But
| it really sucked. Thankfully we had another room that needed to
| be furnished and we threw it in there. But the thing was just
| not comfortable and the pillows started sagging after minimal
| use.
|
| Since then almost every other couch we got was from ikea, since
| if it ended up sucking at least we didn't pay 2-3x the cost for
| it. Which is sad really, I want a nice couch. I just don't that
| paying 10-20x the cost wind just be a piece of junk.
| imp0cat wrote:
| IKEA has some interesting options (cheap copies of designer
| sofas/other stuff).
|
| Here's a quick overview:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0nPPc2-jpE
|
| It's almost like a "How to shop for nice stuff at IKEA 101"
| and covers: 00:22 Sofas 01:28
| Morning Brew 02:29 Lounge Chairs 03:41 Dining
| Chairs 05:34 Tables 07:34 Lighting
| 09:02 Others
| MetaWhirledPeas wrote:
| > read, not-ikea
|
| At least with most IKEA products you assemble them yourself,
| so the level of quality is immediately apparent, and the
| pricing reflects it. I appreciate that straightforward
| approach.
|
| Most everything I've bought there has outlasted my desire to
| keep using it. There are the occasional problems, like a blue
| table where the veneer shows a bright white mark wherever it
| gets nicked, but I feel like many criticisms are unfounded
| and often come across as elitist.
| Arrath wrote:
| I'm considering doing exactly this kind of surgery on my couch,
| how hard was it to put the fabric cover back together?
| angry_moose wrote:
| The only part I had to rip off was the bottom dust cover.
|
| Installing new is pretty cheap and easy - $10 roll and a
| staple gun. Or just leave it off
| Arrath wrote:
| Hmm I don't know if coming in from the bottom will get me
| the access I need, I'm afraid. I've got some bowing across
| the middle of the backrest. But, maybe I'll give it a go
| anyway! Thanks.
| brandensilva wrote:
| West elm has been pretty bad for most stuff for us too.
| Surprisingly we have an okay Urban couch from them that's held
| up well the last 5 years. The cushions haven't maintained their
| shape all that much and the feathers occasionally poke through
| which are my only complaints. Our little kids used to jump on
| it before we moved it downstairs so the frame was at least
| built well and it's still pretty comfortable.
|
| Id never buy one again from them though after having everything
| else fail on us.
| jwells89 wrote:
| The quality of the frame makes a big difference.
|
| About 3 years ago after moving into a new house, I needed a new
| couch and wanted something that would wear reasonably well
| without getting into the higher end ($3k+). I found one on
| Apt2B which they were touting was built around an robotically-
| welded steel frame, lending to consistent durability. After
| reading many sofa reviews mentioning buckling particleboard,
| that sounded pretty good. There weren't a ton of options due to
| pandemic shortages so I went for it, which cost me $1500.
|
| It's held up well so far. Cushions are showing some wear but
| nothing out of the ordinary, and the steel frame is indeed
| solid. It might even be worth reulphostering at some point down
| the road.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| I would expect the seller to fix that. Furniture at that price
| should last much longer. Don't you have any concept of
| 'merchantable quality' in the US?
| unethical_ban wrote:
| Eesh... I have a West Elm couch I got at an outlet for half
| off, so only $1200. It's fairly comfy and looks good, but I
| feel the back cushions will need to be restuffed sooner rather
| than later. I've had it less than a year.
| turtlebits wrote:
| If you want longevity, don't buy "fast fashion" furniture like
| West Elm, Pier One, Wayfair, HomeGoods and even IKEA.
| fy20 wrote:
| The part about springs is interesting because all the sofas I've
| owned in the past decade have used foam, and I don't miss
| springs... When they are new maybe it's ok, but over time they
| wear out and the sofa becomes really noisy and uncomfortable as
| they aren't even. The same thing with mattresses, I'm never
| buying a sprung mattress again.
| o11c wrote:
| Despite the article mentioning other things, it seems like at
| least half the problem can be avoided by never buying furniture
| online.
| dangus wrote:
| Not really. Regular retailers aren't immune.
|
| Let's be real too: nobody's going underneath the sofas at Crate
| and Barrel to see how they're constructed. It doesn't really
| matter that you can see and touch them.
|
| I don't even think the luxury brands are much better (e.g.,
| RH). They'll give you some solid woods and finer materials
| where you can see them. They are better but not by the amount I
| would like.
|
| The cheapness isn't something these manufacturers need to do,
| it's just in their interest. Higher margins, more repeat
| purchases.
|
| It's not like salaries are high in big furniture production
| countries like Vietnam. They could do things in a more labor
| intense way and still make a profit. It's just that they'll
| make more money by making the construction cheap, and making a
| product that lasts decades is a good way to restrict future
| business.
| theGnuMe wrote:
| Darn I was hoping pottery barn would be reliable..
| dangus wrote:
| I'm not a fan of Pottery Barn, I think Crate and Barrel or
| CB2 are the essentially the same products with better
| service.
| arp242 wrote:
| > nobody's going underneath the sofas at Crate and Barrel to
| see how they're constructed.
|
| I also don't really know what to look for. Most people don't.
|
| In the past you could more or less rely on the store being
| somewhat reliable and somewhat trustworthy. I say "somewhat"
| because _of course_ you wouldn 't fully trust a salesman, but
| by and large: you could more or less trust that something was
| "quality" if it was advertised as such, and/or more expensive
| and the cheaper options, usually. You didn't need to have a
| Ph.D. in sofa construction to buy a decent sofa.
|
| Now it's best to assume everything is a lie. Everyone is
| lying to your face, or just don't know what the they're
| talking about. Even expensive items marketed as "quality"
| cannot be relied on being quality at all.
|
| Once upon a time a sofa was a product sold on the market
| because some people needed sofas, and some people and/or
| companies knew how to make them. "A fair product for a fair
| market-conform price". Classic capitalism and free-market
| economics where everyone wins.
|
| But now it no longer matters if people need sofas, or whether
| anyone actually gets anything remote to a "fair deal", or any
| externalities like climate change, or if kids in Vietnam are
| being exploited. Burn the world, as long as I can sell my
| crummy sofa, because "free market allows it" is the only
| logical and moral argument that exists for some people. A
| sofa is no longer a product; it's just the means to making a
| profit. There's a subtle difference between to two.
|
| All of this is part of "the financialisation of everything"
| and "toxic capitalism" that's been going on since the 80s.
| thfuran wrote:
| >Burn the world, as long as I can sell my crummy sofa,
| because "free market allows it"
|
| _That_ is classic capitalism. Econ 101 notions of
| efficient free markets rely on all participants being
| perfect rational actors with perfect information. Snake oil
| salesmen have always relied on the fact that those
| assumptions are inaccurate.
| kalkr wrote:
| I ordered a dresser once from a local store, they bought some
| cheap crap from Amazon and passed it off as "shipping from
| storage". It arrived broken and I couldn't get my money back,
| which I probably would have if I got something similar through
| an online retailer.
| vkou wrote:
| The article seems to exaggerate a bit, because neither in 2024,
| nor in 2004, would I have expected a $1,200 couch to be 'well-
| made'. (Although I wouldn't expect either one to actually fall
| apart in two years of use.)
|
| This isn't exactly a novel problem.
| pyb wrote:
| Correct. According to this 1975 catalog
| https://ikeamuseum.com/en/explore/ikea-
| catalogue/1975-ikea-c..., Ikea sofas could be bought for the
| equivalent of $1000 today.
|
| Higher-end sofas would have logically cost much more...
| bluedino wrote:
| In the Midwest, the "better" option is to buy furniture from "The
| Amish".
|
| Parents bought a living room set, it was double what a similar
| set would be at the local furniture superstore, but the
| fabric/cushions were a new level of terrible. Basically fell
| apart in two years.
|
| It's a great place to find wooden tables, beds, dressers, but
| it's all heavy (as you'd expect) and hard to move.
|
| If I was buying a sofa today I would get something from
| Stressless.
| SauciestGNU wrote:
| Although the furniture quality is excellent, I worry about
| supporting child labor when doing business with the Amish. They
| pull their kids out of school after grade 8 to put them to
| work. I've also heard various things regarding the commonality
| of abusive practices within their religion. Trade-offs for
| everything!
| inglor_cz wrote:
| "supporting child labor"
|
| From their point of view, the modern society may be
| needlessly infantilizing people who are halfway to adulthood.
|
| We even treat university students like kids, hence all the
| obsession with micromanaging their campus experience.
| nozzlegear wrote:
| Child labor seems a bit more serious a concern.
| illiac786 wrote:
| There's a big range between 8 year old and average first
| year university student...
| inglor_cz wrote:
| " after grade 8 " (the OPs concern) is more like 15 y.o.,
| right?
| illiac786 wrote:
| Oops, misread.
| schneems wrote:
| Even at 15 years old you're still a long way away from
| having a fully developed pre-frontal cortex.
|
| We used to think kids were like little adults, then we
| learned a bit about how the brain develops and how wildly
| wrong that mental model was.
| Tade0 wrote:
| Looking at the level of independence I and my peers
| handled at this age vs what is the norm now we might have
| overdone it.
| Aeolun wrote:
| I mean, to some extend, but I don't necessarily think
| that working is bad for a 13 year old. If they can work
| in a supermarket to earn some side income they can work
| anywhere (under limited guidance).
| treflop wrote:
| Isn't that just the average though?
|
| I've met plenty of wickedly level-headed 15 year olds and
| a whole lot of irresponsible 30 year olds.
|
| The variation is such to an extreme level too.
| tasuki wrote:
| This has been my experience too!
| inglor_cz wrote:
| When I was 15, my brain was definitely pubescent and far
| from fully developed.
|
| But I was able to make some money by fixing computers or
| translating stuff from English to Czech anyway. There was
| no exploitation in those labor relations just because I
| was young.
|
| I am not manually skilled, but I can definitely see
| someone at 15 making a nice chair or a table instead.
|
| I don't think that 15 y.o.s should be treated as fully
| adult, some limitations on their work are perfectly OK
| (no ardous work, no work underground etc.). But barring
| them from working altogether will probably slow their
| development down. Not everything can be learnt from books
| or models, some real-world practice, including the most
| basic elements of interaction with customers/employers,
| is necessary.
| graemep wrote:
| Yes, but the same is true (a bit less so) of an 18 year
| old and most places allow 18 year olds to work, drive,
| vote, join the military, enter into binding contracts as
| adults etc.
|
| While teenagers are not fully adult in some ways, they
| are also very different from a 12 year old.
| gilfoy wrote:
| yes my furniture is crafted exclusively by highly skilled
| 13 year olds.
| imp0cat wrote:
| Furniture AND iPhones ;)
| graemep wrote:
| So not far off compulsory school age in the UK, which is
| approximately 16. We do not get accused of child labour.
|
| Until recently you could work once you left school. Now
| you cannot do a full time job until you are 18, but can
| become an apprentice (so you get some training as well as
| working). There is nothing to stop you doing nothing.
|
| The requirement to not work until you are 18 has not been
| particularly beneficial. Brought to you (IIRC) by the
| same government that massively expanded the higher
| education system (a huge increase in the proportion of
| people going to university) for no real benefit.
| tengbretson wrote:
| > They pull their kids out of school after grade 8
|
| This is inaccurate. Their schooling is complete after grade
| 8.
| SauciestGNU wrote:
| Like hell it is. What they want their kids learning is
| irrelevant, it's a travesty of "religious freedom" that we
| don't require this cult to educate their children to the
| same uniform standard as every other person in our society.
| throwaway892238 wrote:
| I dropped out of school in 9th grade. I make $200K a
| year. A friend of mine has a college degree and has been
| unemployed for a year.
|
| There is no uniform standard of education in the US. Kids
| in the South are being taught that evolution is on par
| with intelligent design. Poor black kids in Baltimore
| have on average a 3rd grade reading level in high school,
| while rich kids a few counties away are taught when to
| use a backdoor roth ira. Don't even mention "no child
| left behind".
|
| Maybe let's calm down a bit with the judgement.
| boringg wrote:
| "few counties away are taught when to use a backdoor roth
| ira" What are you on about? Nobody is talking about a
| back door roth IRA in high school.
| tengbretson wrote:
| They are not "people in your society". They have their
| own society and you are not a member.
| SeanAnderson wrote:
| I've been very happy with my Lovesac sofa, but its pricing is
| borderline extortionate.
| Moto7451 wrote:
| They seem to have specials at Costco periodically. They're not
| my thing but I suggest taking their discount if you can.
| adsims2001 wrote:
| I am happy with my Lovesac sofa, too. It was expensive, but I
| can't think of another product I could expect to be as happy
| with, so Lovesac seems to be in a class of their own and can
| demand whatever price they want.
|
| In particular, it's comfortable, well built, but not bulky. I
| can take it apart move it in my regular sized SUV if needed. I
| move a lot, and eventually grew tired of bulky things that were
| difficult or impossible to move without professional help.
|
| I also tried a Burrow sofa which has the same modular
| properties, but it was not comfortable at all and I had to
| return it
| wsatb wrote:
| Their cushion quality can be hit or miss, but I'll say they're
| pretty receptive to exchanges.
|
| Also, never pay full price. They offer 25-35% off many times
| per year, usually around holidays.
| 303uru wrote:
| Most are cheap junk bought sight unseen. My stressless couches
| are built from real wood, full grain leather, etc... My eames
| chair likewise. But you're adding a 5-10x multiplyer to furniture
| costs for that quality.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I hear this a lot, but my fairly inexpensive IKEA sofa is about
| eight years old with no problems at all so far.
|
| EDIT: Actually, in general I've found that my IKEA furniture has
| done pretty well (basically everything in the house is IKEA) with
| the sole exception of a "Lack" coffee table, whose surface is
| kinda disintegrating after 8 years (I think it's basically made
| of cardboard with a veneer...). The name should perhaps have been
| a warning.
| i80and wrote:
| I got an IKEA couch about 9 years ago. It was like... $700? The
| construction is definitely very cheap and you can tell if you
| flip it on its back, but it's very comfortable and sturdy
| enough that it still feels solid in normal use.
|
| I don't think "cheap" construction is necessarily a bad thing,
| honestly. There's ways to do cheap construction such that it
| works just fine.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Ikea has to engineer it. They are a global company and they
| can invest in engineering to avoid as many returns/refunds.
| It's worth it to them.
|
| So while the materials are cheap and the style not high end,
| from what I've seen they maximize the engineering to make it
| durable.
| IggleSniggle wrote:
| Yup, we've had the same IKEA furniture for 16 years now, it's
| still going strong.
| baby wrote:
| For some reason people hate IKEA in the US. Was trying to sell
| a standing desk I bought there for 750$ and nobody wanted it.
| Ended up selling it for 150$. I also had a Jarvis and it was
| gone in an instant, even though the IKEA one was much much
| better.
|
| I Often hear people saying that IKEA furnitures don't travel
| well or don't last long. It's like we're not going to the same
| IKEA.
| sircastor wrote:
| I think a lot of this is attached to a puritan-based work
| ethic. If something isn't hard to do, or require a lot of
| time and energy then it's not of high quality or worth
| having.
|
| It's probably a signaling thing too...
| etrautmann wrote:
| Possibly, though some products like the PAX just truly
| don't move well even once.
| fabioborellini wrote:
| Yes, Pax is only sturdy when mounted to a wall. It is
| very unstable by itself. But isn't it meant to be
| permanently installed? I'm expecting to leave my Pax when
| I'm moving out.
| swatcoder wrote:
| IKEA is _beloved_ by many in the US and generally one of the
| most specifically in-demand brands in the market for used
| contemporary furniture. You might just be in an unusual
| region or had some other reasons why your listings didn 't
| perform the way you expected.
|
| That said, I _am_ one of those people who doesn 't get a lot
| from them so I can speak to some of criticism. Part of it is
| just the aesthetic, and theirs doesn't match how I decorate
| my own space or what I usually feel good around. That's just
| the nature of aesthetics, though, and there's always going to
| be some difference in taste between any two people and any
| two regions.
|
| As for quality, though, I think the critique you hear
| reflects the quality of their budget products. If you're
| eyeing modern or euro designs at a fancy furniture studio and
| then go to IKEA to find a cheap approximation, you discover
| that much of the cheapest stuff has the same flimsy
| glueboard, peeling laminate, and unstable joinery of the
| cheap stuff at Wal-mart.
|
| That shouldn't rally be a surprise (cheap is cheap for a
| reason) and doesn't hold true for their mid-range and higher
| products. And heck, it's not even really fair when Walmart
| and Target furniture isn't any better, but it's enough to
| keep feeding the reputation.
| JohnFen wrote:
| I legitimately had no idea IKEA sold anything of real
| quality. TIL.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I mean, it depends what you mean by 'real quality';
| you're not going to get hand-crafted expertly made stuff
| that will last for centuries or anything. But for the
| price, their mid to high end stuff is excellent.
| JohnFen wrote:
| I don't mean anything like artisan or hand-crafted. I
| mean well-built, out of quality materials. A good quality
| table, for instance, should last decades.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I think a lot of their solid wood stuff (it's not all
| chipboard!) would fit the bill, tbh. You do have to be
| slightly careful with the assembly (it's not difficult,
| but some people like to treat the instructions as
| suggestions, and then get annoyed when it falls apart...)
| valicord wrote:
| I'm writing this comment sitting at a basic IKEA
| particleboard desk that I've had since 2014. It has
| survived daily usage for 10 years and 2 moves (one coast-
| to-coast). The only signs of wear is some scuffed paint
| where the hands rest in front of the keyboard and veneer
| is starting to peel slightly in one the corner.
| ghaff wrote:
| Yeah, I have a couple of Ikea chairs in a room that
| replaced (cheap) wicker that was falling apart. They
| haven't been used hard but, to me, they were pretty
| inexpensive, look good, and are very comfortable.
|
| On the other hand, I bought a dresser with a lot of
| particle board and, no, it's by no means well made. But
| it's in a bedroom and it works. I could have spent 4x (or
| more) for a nicely made hardwood dresser from a good New
| England brand. But even getting it into the bedroom
| upstairs might have been a bit of an adventure.
| KerrAvon wrote:
| Have you never been in an IKEA store? They sell a lot of
| solid wood.
|
| I have IKEA furniture that's lasted for decades. It's
| value-optimized, but it's usually well designed; if you
| put it together properly, it will last.
| munificent wrote:
| I think IKEA is sort of like the Toyota of furniture. It
| doesn't look amazing, but it's higher quality than the
| price would lead you to believe because they work very
| hard to design things economically.
| Gigachad wrote:
| It's also engineered incredibly well. There are no weak
| points or flaws in the design. It feels like someone
| poured their heart and soul in to producing the absolute
| strongest and most practical item possible given the
| budget.
| jtc331 wrote:
| Please tell me you're not still talking about IKEA.
| Gigachad wrote:
| I am. So many other companies products seem to have one
| weak spot that completely ruins an otherwise strong
| design. Meanwhile ikea stuff seems perfectly designed for
| the material budget.
|
| This chair for example is way stronger than it has any
| right to be. I've seen it used in a ton of cafes so it
| clearly holds up to heavy usage
| https://www.ikea.com/au/en/p/taernoe-chair-outdoor-
| foldable-...
|
| The look and price feels like it should be a flimsy piece
| of junk but in reality it's incredibly solid.
| KptMarchewa wrote:
| God no, it's awful. At least 50% too small in all
| dimensions. It's a chair that deliberately ignores that
| someone larger than 160cm 50kg girl might sit on it.
| Solvency wrote:
| Found IKEA's CEO everybody.
| maxglute wrote:
| If one wants durable from IKEA, shop by material. They have
| sheet steel and solid wood that will outlast any particle
| board. The steel is a little thin on the budget line and
| the wood is not very aesthetic for some tastes, but they
| usually have options that last or outperforms more
| expensive particle board furniture that are more complex
| due to aesthetics. Hell even plastic there is fine, so many
| cafes with shitty beater IKEA cafe furniture.
| tonyarkles wrote:
| The other thing you can do is glue-and-screw instead of
| just using the screws. I've had a bookshelf or two break
| due to the screws blowing out of the chipboard during a
| move. Using regular wood glue/PVA meant that that never
| happened again although it also means you can't
| disassemble it. Disassembling is kind of overrated
| though, the screws don't ever go in as tight the second
| time, especially after it's been sitting loaded with
| books for a few years.
| BonoboIO wrote:
| Underrated trick for ikea furniture. Do not use the ikea
| nails, they are junk ... use staples.
|
| Much stronger, easier to remove and you can remove them
| without damaging the part like the back of PAX
| tonyarkles wrote:
| Oh, yeah, I discovered this not because I thought staples
| would be stronger but because I built one shelf first and
| was tired of trying to nail those stupid brad nails in by
| hand... so for the next shelf I pulled out the staple
| gun. Was so impressed with how much more rigid it felt
| that I went behind the other shelf and drove a bunch of
| staples through the backing cardboard :)
| mindslight wrote:
| When replacing screws in soft material, I slowly turn
| them to the left to feel when they drop into the existing
| thread rather than making new grooves. And in my
| experience, IKEA furniture reassembles fine multiple
| times. You also have to make sure such screws are and
| remain tight, because if they start getting loose that
| working back and forth will destroy the threads of the
| softer material. If a piece of furniture isn't solid,
| figure out why and shore it up before it gets
| progressively worse.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Yeah, they're definitely opinionated about design.
| Personally, I like it, but if the design doesn't work for
| you, Ikea isn't going to work for you.
| alright2565 wrote:
| > you discover that much of the cheapest stuff has the same
| flimsy glueboard, peeling laminate, and unstable joinery of
| the cheap stuff at Wal-mart.
|
| I'm not going to argue too much with this, but I think this
| is underselling Ikea quite a bit.
|
| Their cheap stuff is definitely made out of cheap
| materials. But I've found it to be well-engineered compared
| to walmart with reinforcements in critical places and
| general overall good quality control (doesn't come pre-
| scratched).
|
| Walmart-level furniture on the other hand is often designed
| to look a certain way, with no consideration for how loads
| will be placed on it or long-term durability.
| bombcar wrote:
| For what it's worth I've had better luck with Walmart
| furniture than Ikea, but that was because I was careful
| about the Walmart stuff and just trusted the Ikea would
| be fine.
| rtpg wrote:
| I feel like the cheapest thing in a certain price
| category in IKEA is "doesn't survive two moves" stuff,
| but everything above it is ... basically fine. Like it's
| a table, there's only so many ways to put 4 metal bars
| and a piece of wood on top. It'll be fine.
| Aeolun wrote:
| The quality of IKEA budget products is far higher than you
| should expect for the price.
| cchi_co wrote:
| I appreciate IKEA for offering good quality products at
| affordable prices
| TylerE wrote:
| I think more than a bit of it is typical American trademark
| laziness and inability to follow directions. I see so many
| of the bookcases without the backing sheet on them. Even if
| it's just thin cardboard, it provides a lot more of the
| structural integrity than you might think. The point is to
| keep the cubes from deforming and having a progressive
| failure.
| azza2110 wrote:
| The bracing provided by the backing sheet makes all the
| difference.
|
| Some of the simple desks the sell are nothing more than a
| tabletop and four screw in legs. With no bracing the desk
| is unpleasantly wobbly.
|
| The very popular Ikea cube bookcases
| (https://www.ikea.com/us/en/cat/kallax-shelving-
| units-58285/) aren't sold with a backing sheet -
| thankfully they seem stiff enough without it.
| mortenjorck wrote:
| I think the reason for this is simple: Ikea does make _some_
| pretty poor-quality furniture, but it 's often on the floor
| right next to some very well-built stuff that will last for
| many years.
|
| Price is sometimes an indicator (I bought two Ikea dressers
| ~15 years ago; I kept the cheaper one for only a few years
| while the more expensive one is still going strong) but not
| always (my 18-year-old sofa was the entry-level option at the
| time).
| resource_waste wrote:
| Back in 2012 I furnished a home with Ikea furniture.
|
| Yes I hate them.
|
| You'd spend $60 on a book case and spend the next 4 hours
| trying to understand what the instructions mean and how to
| build it. You also needed a partner to hold corners together.
|
| Now today, the furniture instructions are better and instead
| 16 different weird fastener, there are 8.
|
| Its a frustration thing. Ikea didn't really do anything but
| be low cost. We blame Ikea like we blame Walmart for having
| drug addicts.
| illiac786 wrote:
| I think this every time I built something ikea, then I
| build something from another brand and I discover a new
| abyss, then I go back to ikea. It's a cycle.
| nytesky wrote:
| Agreed, self assembly is terrible but IKEA is generally
| the least terrible.
| vundercind wrote:
| Yeah I don't get the complaints about IKEA instructions.
| They have the best furniture-assembly directions I've
| seen.
|
| They have a lot in common with old LEGO set instructions.
| Maybe people who hate them didn't do a bunch of that as a
| child?
| KerrAvon wrote:
| I'm with you -- I've assembled a lot of random stuff
| recently and I wish everyone had instructions half as
| good as IKEA's.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Yeah, I'm not particularly handy (I break out in a cold
| sweat whenever anything requires more than trivial
| assembly), but I've never had any issue with assembling
| Ikea stuff.
| Aeolun wrote:
| I have a really hard time understanding people that don't
| get how to assemble furniture of that kind in general.
|
| Instructions or no instructions, there's only so many
| ways you can put a bunch of planks together.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| I know these people. They aren't stupid. Many of them
| just aren't good at visualizing things they haven't done
| or been shown before.
|
| They may know X should go into Y but the task is so
| unfamiliar or counter to how they think that they hit
| their working memory limit before it makes sense to them.
|
| Impatience just makes that worse.
|
| IKEA's instructions are extremely helpful in this case.
| Gigachad wrote:
| Probably poor spacial reasoning skills. Didn't spend
| enough time playing with Lego or sticking wood blocks
| through shaped holes.
| adaml_623 wrote:
| I love IKEA instructions and construction. I honestly get a
| buzz from the puzzle. If I have to construct more than one
| of an item then I'll compete with myself on speed and
| efficiency.
| askvictor wrote:
| It's basically Lego for adults (which was more exciting
| until Lego pushed its market into the adult demographic).
|
| Which is actually part of Ikea's brand identity. When you
| put it together yourself, you feel closer to the
| furniture than if someone just plonked it at your house.
| OTOH, if you hate that kind of thing, you'll never go
| back, but I guess they have an assembly service these
| days.
| nytesky wrote:
| $750 for an IKEA desk is crazy money. Does it have hydraulics
| to raise and lower the desk?
|
| But depreciation on IKEA is huge because while it can last a
| long time within a household, it moves very poorly so if it
| has been moved or reassembled once or twice, it's likely near
| end of life. But hard to evaluate that, it's not like it has
| an odometer -- hence value for used it very low.
| koyote wrote:
| Those desks do have hydraulics:
| https://www.ikea.com/au/en/p/bekant-desk-sit-stand-
| white-s09...
|
| Ikea's goods usually come in different price ranges with
| the most expensive often not being 'cheap' but 'cheap given
| the quality'. That being said, often their cheapest stuff
| is the best value for money because it's so cheap that it
| lasting more than a year would be a miracle (but they
| usually do!).
| askvictor wrote:
| > Those desks do have hydraulics:
|
| Well, an electric motor
| jsight wrote:
| Yeah, ikea standing desk prices are crazy. There are plenty
| of comparable products on Amazon for a lot less money. I
| kept looking at them in the store thinking that there must
| be something that could warrant the price, but I just can't
| see it.
| JohnFen wrote:
| I don't hate IKEA at all, but I've found that a lot of their
| furniture doesn't last more than a couple of years. I
| consider it "temporary furniture".
| jghn wrote:
| It really depends. IKEA runs the entire range of very
| temporary to actually pretty good. The trick is knowing
| which is which, although price points are usually a good
| indicator.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Yeah, I dunno, maybe it's different stuff in the US? I know
| at least some of the items are different.
|
| With the exception of the aforementioned table (which I think
| cost about 8 euro at the time, so, really, what did I expect)
| I've found all their stuff to be of very decent quality,
| certainly better than what you could get from 'traditional'
| furniture stores at the same price.
| KerrAvon wrote:
| The problem with used IKEA furniture is that it's all DIY-
| assembled. You don't really know if it was built properly.
| quartesixte wrote:
| Same here -- I have an Ikea bedframe that's nearly a 2
| decades old at this point and has moved four times. An office
| chair lasted me 7 years. Bookcases over a decade old.
|
| I grew up in a nearly all Ikea household, and it's only later
| in life I have discovered their reputation.
|
| Am I missing something?
| StressedDev wrote:
| No - Some of Ikea's furniture really lasts. I have a 25
| year old Ikea couch. It needs to be reupholstered but it is
| still comfortable.
| swader999 wrote:
| I just don't like walking through their ENTIRE store.
| Tagbert wrote:
| You should start at the warehouse section and walk though
| it in reverse to get where you want to be.
| onli wrote:
| You don't have to. Every IKEA store has shortcuts to
| quickly go to the section you want. And at the start, after
| the stairs usually, you can go directly to the restaurant
| and to the small stuff section, if you want to skip the
| furniture show rooms completely.
|
| IKEA is actually awesome for this scenario.
| swader999 wrote:
| Wife no shortcut.
| tasuki wrote:
| Understandable, but hard to blame IKEA ;)
| Aeolun wrote:
| > I Often hear people saying that IKEA furnitures don't
| travel well or don't last long. It's like we're not going to
| the same IKEA.
|
| I mean, if you are comparing with heirloom class furniture
| then that's certainly true. After taking the cabinet or bed
| apart and sticking it together 4 or 5 times, you certainly
| start to notice some degradation. But then we're talking
| about a factor 100 price difference.
| ericd wrote:
| The thing is, antique stores are stuffed to the gills with
| heirloom class furniture, and it doesn't cost 100x the
| amount. Gorgeous solid cherry, mahogany, etc, where even
| the backs and drawer bottoms are solid can be had for a
| song. We recently tried to find a mostly solid wood IKEA
| dresser, but because they're switching all their designs to
| new anti-tip designs over the next few months, almost
| everything was out of stock. So we decided to look a bit
| further afield, and we went to our local antique shop. We
| ended up spending $600 for a totally refinished solid
| cherry dresser, delivered into our room. It's stunning,
| totally solid cherry, and I think slightly less expensive
| than the IKEA dresser we were trying to get. Not spending 2
| hours cranking screws was a really nice bonus.
| Aeolun wrote:
| Hmm, I'm not sure that's necessarily true everywhere. We
| replaced our IKEA (or equivalent) stuff with solid wood
| antiques and they were all $1000+. We had only two items
| to really replace, but compared to the $50 that the IKEA
| stuff cost it was quite an expense.
| ericd wrote:
| Yeah, maybe this place was unusually cheap, but chatting
| with the owner made it sound like the supply far
| outstripped the demand, so I don't think that's
| fundamentally true. That said, I'd still take the $1000
| solid antique over the $600 mostly solid IKEA piece.
| xandrius wrote:
| Yeah, most stuff at Ikea is either decent or crap temporary
| things.
|
| Also the style does get really old pretty fast for me.
|
| I think good second hand furniture is where it's at: you get
| to not buy yet another new thing and get something solid and
| good.
| class3shock wrote:
| In the US alot of peoples first experience with Ikea is
| buying the cheapest desk, couch, bookcase, etc. for a dorm
| room or first apartment. And those are largely trash that
| won't survive a move, spilled water, accidental bump, etc.
|
| They have a line of pine furniture I like, as well as other
| things that are solid for the price (their kitchen cabinets)
| but you only have one chance to make a first impression as
| they say.
| vmladenov wrote:
| I dislike their engineered wood stuff. It's decent for
| furnishing an apartment but for more permanent things real
| hardwood just feels nicer, and IKEA has relatively few
| options with that material.
|
| I had an engineered wood bed frame from them split in half,
| whereas an older IKEA pine (not hardwood but whatever) bed
| frame still lives on.
| theGnuMe wrote:
| IKEA is better then almost everything by Ashley home
| furnishings.
| atomicfiredoll wrote:
| After a lot of digging a few years ago, I settled on the IKEA
| Finnala. So far it's held up pretty well.
|
| It's not as well made as quality pieces, but I worked from the
| assumption that any couch I bought would be trash. Some of the
| nice things about a buying into a system like the Finnala are
| that when an arm, cushion, cover, or whatever fails, I can just
| replace that piece; there are aftermarket covers and legs; if I
| move it can be disassembled; and if a new place is smaller, the
| whole thing doesn't have to be trashed.
|
| I love quality furniture, but it doesn't always fit the bill
| for a society where people can't afford a single family house
| or put down roots. (Note: that still doesn't necessarily
| justify all the items being sold today that are destined for a
| landfill in a few years.)
| mortenjorck wrote:
| I have an Ikea Lillberg sofa from _2005_ that I never dreamed I
| would hold onto as long as I have.
|
| Every time I've moved, I think this will be the time I replace
| it, but the joinery has stayed rock-solid, the wood has aged
| beautifully (though I admit this is likely owing to a lack of
| pets or children) and even the upholstery has never pilled or
| visibly worn (though I keep thinking about ordering a
| replacement slipcover set from Comfort Works, which makes
| aftermarket upgrades for long-since-discontinued Ikea
| products). And the minimalist, Danish-influenced style somehow
| never looks out of place no matter what else I put around it.
|
| This article has me thinking I may yet keep the Lillberg for
| years to come.
| vizzier wrote:
| You're quite correct about the Lack. They're cheap as hell (15
| bucks at time of writing?), but as a result quite
| manipulatable, such as creating 3d printer enclosures [0]. You
| can see some of their insides as they go through the process.
|
| [0] https://blog.prusa3d.com/mmu2s-printer-enclosure_30215/
| Ekaros wrote:
| Now that I look Finnish prices it is surprising. The coffee
| table is 40/50EUR, tv stand is 15EUR. Side table 8EUR or
| 10EUR for next size.
|
| Okay those cheap ones make sense, but for coffee table it is
| robbery...
| Scoundreller wrote:
| The "enterprise edition" is more than three times as
| expensive, while providing less stability than two of the
| regular products combined.
|
| https://wiki.eth0.nl/index.php/LackRack
| shagie wrote:
| The LACK RACK https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=eth0.nl
|
| Though I'm also going to point out that a LACK side table
| ($13 now) for 8 years is a rather good deal.
|
| The internals are revealed on the Ikea page too:
| https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/lack-side-table-black-
| brown-801...
| evilduck wrote:
| I made a Lego table out of one Lack end table, four Lego
| baseplates and some rubber cement. The baseplates cost about
| 2x what the table did.
| HdS84 wrote:
| At least in Germany quality has gone downhill.
|
| I still own some Billies made in 1995 or so by Ikea. Literally
| massive wood and damn good book shelves. The ones bought by me
| in 2008 or so very noticeably less well build but still ok. The
| ones we bought in 2018 or so are shit, especially the shelves
| are so thin that they begin to sag.
|
| In 2008 or so a friend of mine bought a "kallax" (another name
| then) and it was awesome, it's still in his basement and looks
| good. We bought one in 2023 and it's basically only paint, some
| "wood" and air. It's ok to store stuff in, but it's impossible
| to drill a screw into the wood. It's like trying to screw
| paper.
| atombender wrote:
| KALLAX used to be EXPEDIT. Both were made from honeycombed
| cardboard (mostly air, as you say) covered with very thin
| sheets of painted MDF. Maybe there was a time EXPEDIT was
| more solid, but I had one in the 1990s, and it was just like
| this.
|
| You _can_ drill the thin wood in IKEA furniture like this,
| but you have to reinforce it.
|
| IKEA has always had a mix of wobbly instacrap and solid
| stuff. I remember they made a short-lived modular shelf
| called BRODER [1], which was solid steel and came in wall-
| mounted or freestanding configurations, the kind of solid
| thing you want in a garage or storage space. I was shocked at
| how high-end it was. It was discontinued to cost and low
| sales.
|
| [1]
| https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3209/3641557199_eb0860e9eb.jpg
| HdS84 wrote:
| Thanks, that's fascinating. Ar least in my recollection,
| the expedit I knew was comparable to a Billy in wood
| density, but I might be mistaken - it's nearly twenty
| years.
|
| Funnily, the most sturdy piece of furniture we own is from
| Ikea. Two massive desks build from solid steel frames and a
| plate made with wood furnishing. Totally indestructible,
| weighs a ton and was made by Ikea in the 99s or so. Funnily
| enough, we didn't even know that they where from Ikea. We
| inherited them from my father in law and were cursing their
| weight like "man I wish Ikea made this, than it would be
| easier to carry". After dismantling them for transport we
| discovered various Ikea stickers. Sadly we don't know the
| model, just that they where manufactured by Ikea.
|
| The most endurable piece of furniture I know of is the
| kitchen of my mother in law. Made in the 70s or so it uses
| resopal finishing and the counters itself looks like new,
| despite years of heavy use and non stop smoking.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Kallax is cardboard? Those brilliant bastards.
|
| Honestly those cubes at least the 4x4 are perfectly fine.
| And cardboard is a hell of a lot more sustainable than
| solid wood and probably particle board
| atombender wrote:
| Structurally they're fine, and can hold a fair amount of
| weight. Just treat them well; don't cut/drill into them
| or let them near water (the cardboard gets soft), don't
| overload them, and don't move/lift them while they're
| filled with heavy objects. While they're cheaply made,
| they're not among IKEA's worst products, I think.
| imp0cat wrote:
| Yes, they are suprisingly versatile. Also, thanks to
| their low weight (aka "cheapness") they are easy to
| transport and assemble.
| maxglute wrote:
| Kallax redesign thinned out outer walls of previous
| Expedite by 1cm so it looks closer to the thickness of
| the shelves and dividers. Also saves on a lot of material
| I imagine with the volumes involved. Also soften edges to
| be kid friendly and more scratch resistent finish.
| Cheaper, looks more aesthetically balanced IMO, and
| basically as statically strong holding stuff and doing
| furniture work. But thinner walls makes difficult/wobbly
| moving in larger 4x4, 5x5 variations.
|
| I had to cinched a band of webbing around the outside of
| the shelf during move to prevent it from falling apart.
| Gluing all the dowels/joints/connection also helps with
| strength a lot, but who has time for that.
| dahauns wrote:
| I have a lot to complain about their decline in quality (at
| least with IVAR they realized they've gone too far and
| reintroduced metal rails) - but don't diss my boy
| EXPEDIT/KALLAX. :)
|
| IMO, it's one of their most brilliantly engineered pieces
| of furniture. Sure, it's engineered to be cheap - but
| definitely not cheaply engineered. The whole geometry etc.
| is designed around what is possible with the materials.
|
| They are really low-priced, versatile, easy to move, and
| TBH, for veneered cardboard it has no right to still be
| _this_ sturdy, especially the 2x4 and smaller variants -
| and as another poster has said, even the large ones, as
| long as you don 't try to move them around with heavy stuff
| inside. Just be dilligent when assembling and see that the
| screws are tightened really well.
| al_borland wrote:
| I avoided the LACK after seeing someone spill drink and
| watching it bubble up like paper.
|
| My coffee table is still from IKEA, but it's metal. I've had it
| for 11 years now. It's on wheels and some of them look like
| they've seen some stress over the years... and it's been moved
| to 8 homes in those 11 years, which could have been the cause.
| But it still works great and I don't know the the average
| person visiting my home would notice that.
|
| I have been thinking of getting something a little larger and
| more grown up, but I love the functionality of the wheels, how
| it can get out of the way, and that I don't have to baby it. It
| doesn't look like they sell it anymore, but it was $40 well
| spent.
| KptMarchewa wrote:
| Well, it is literally paper laid in a honeycomb pattern.
| tonyarkles wrote:
| Congrats on the new server rack when you decide to take it out
| of service as an end-table:
| https://wiki.eth0.nl/index.php/LackRack
|
| Also... I haven't priced out Lack tables in a while but it
| looks like they're still only $20?! I last bought one in
| probably 2006 and they were $20CAD at the time.
| munificent wrote:
| IKEA is a fascinating outlier in this discussion.
|
| At some point in my twenties, I decided it was time to upgrade
| from my broke college student IKEA lifestyle which to me meant
| West Elm. Every thing I got from West Elm was absolute garbage
| and none of it lasted more than a handful of years.
|
| Now I'm in the prime of my career and could move up to
| something actually nice if I really wanted to, like Design
| Within Reach (truly the most ironic business name in
| existence). But it's just so hard for me to justify a 5x or
| more price jump, when, honestly, the IKEA furniture I have has
| been _so good_.
|
| I have a decade-old IKEA couch that is still in great shape
| despite surviving cats, dogs, young children, a snoring spouse
| who slept on it every night for about a year, and being mostly
| occupied throughout the entire pandemic. It's a tank, and still
| looks good to me.
|
| I think I've committed myself to having a style that is
| basically "IKEA + some vintage stuff" which seems to work well
| quality wise and is about an order of magnitude cheaper than
| getting new quality non-IKEA furniture.
| Solvency wrote:
| So your snoring spouse: what happened after a year? Divorce?
| Did the snoring stop? How?
| Wohlf wrote:
| I've found Ikea furniture is great and lasts a long time as
| long as you don't move it to another apartment, that seems to
| really stress the joints and it will get rickety after 2-3
| moves.
| seydor wrote:
| Ditto, my kivik has lasted so well that i didnt have the heart
| to get rid of it. It helps that there are many stores that sell
| custom covers of all kinds of fabrics.
|
| IKEA has also however gone downhill compared to ~10 years ago,
| however. A Poang today, compared to 10 years ago: does not have
| beveled edges on the wood (which makes it look cheaper and feel
| less 'soft'), and is even slightly narrower, so that the old
| cushions dont really fit in the new one.
|
| I think we are seing the effect of increasing prices and
| breakdown of global supply chains there
| bombcar wrote:
| I've liked reading this blog -
| https://insidersguidetofurniture.com/buyers-guide-to-furnitu...
| and basically what it comes down to is most modern cushioning
| will fail in five years or so.
|
| You need 2.5 density foam or higher, or you need a "uncushioned"
| style couch.
| rapnie wrote:
| I have two pre-WWII Gispen chairs with thick foam seats, and
| only recently (last couple years) they started to dry out
| (become 'crispy' at the top surface). I suspect it is because I
| am not actively using them anymore, rather than because of
| their age.
| jonah wrote:
| I second your comment on high-quality foam. If you're looking
| at re-doing some old furniture or having your own made, study
| up on foam - not just the density - which is important - but
| also the type and grade. Decent stuff should last 25+ years -
| and be more comfortable along the way.
|
| (A little tip - the density you want for proper comfort varies
| by the thickness of the cushion, the weight of the intended
| users, and the whether it's the seat bottom or the back. The
| back needing a softer foam.)
| wonderwonder wrote:
| Made the mistake of buying a couch off Wayfair for a little nook
| in my office. It lasted a year before I got rid of it. Never
| again. Couches really are one of those areas where you get what
| you pay for. With the possible exception of Ikea. Got an Ikea
| couch for my 10 year old's room and its holding up remarkably
| well.
| romafirst3 wrote:
| Wayfair is absolute trash.
|
| Pictures look good but it always disappoints. It's the one
| online furniture store I will never buy from again.
| hatthew wrote:
| Maybe I got lucky, but I am quite happy with the desk I got
| from wayfair a couple years ago. It may not be fancy, but
| it's sturdy, durable, customizable, and probably less than
| half the cost of a high-end solid hardwood desk.
| bloomingeek wrote:
| Next time you stay at a mid-range or better hotel, notice the
| furniture. They don't but junk because in the long run it never
| lasts, and whose going to pay for a nice hotel room with tacky
| furniture?
|
| A couple of months ago, we stayed in a newer Holiday Inn Express.
| The bed and cabinets were very nice and well built.
| theGnuMe wrote:
| I imagine holiday inn is all custom built to spec.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| All the hotel brands have design schemes, and contract with
| certain designers who the hotel owners have to buy from.
|
| For example:
|
| https://www.charterfurniture.com/products/hospitality/desk-t.
| ..
|
| https://www.taisenfurniture.com/ihg-hotel-bedroom-set/
| radicality wrote:
| Or common areas in offices / apartment buildings. For example,
| the building I live in has nice couches that look like they can
| take a lot of traffic. I once looked at the brand tag - Ligne
| Roset. It's not cheap, but at least does seem high quality.
| bombcar wrote:
| They revamp furniture more often than you might realize,
| because even great quality stuff looks tired and worn after
| awhile. Investigate and you can usually find the liquidator in
| your area that handles them.
| patwolf wrote:
| About 10 years ago I went shopping at Furnitureland South,
| mentioned in the article. The selection was a bit overwhelming,
| but we picked out a solid wood bedroom set from a manufacturer in
| Canada. It's held up great, as has my kids' IKEA bedroom
| furniture.
|
| I've purchased couches from West Elm, Restoration Hardware, and a
| few other well-known places, and they've all been disappointing.
| From now on I'll stick to Furnitureland and IKEA, but I don't
| know if I have the energy to go couch shopping at Furnitureland.
| nytesky wrote:
| Our kids destroy all the nice furniture (dumb ways, like
| sitting on couch soaking wet from the pool, spilling food,
| drawing on the cushion while doing homework or a project, doing
| gymnastics off the cushions, fort building). They aren't
| actively destructive like attacking with scissors but I can't
| see investing in nice furniture until they are adults (even
| teens can be rough as you can imagine). By then, I don't know
| if I'll care?
| swatcoder wrote:
| This is a good dig into changes in design and manufacturing
| trends, which makes sense for Dwell, but I suspect we'd see more
| people complaining about their furniture quality these days even
| without manufacturing changes because many people are like 50%
| heavier than the people in sitting in couches 50 years ago -- and
| often more likely to collapse into a sofa than to set themselves
| down upon it.
|
| So it's actually kind of a two sided loss in quality: the designs
| are flimsier even while the engineering requirements have become
| more demanding.
| pornel wrote:
| OT:
|
| I can't read the site due to a massive "We value your privacy"
| pop up informing me about the _1532_ data-harvesting "partners"
| they sell information to, and there's only "Allow All" button
| accessible (which is illegal by GDPR).
|
| They really value my privacy, for its resale value.
| Joel_Mckay wrote:
| Because people don't want to pay for good plywood, proper
| webbing, and quality fabrics. Real furniture weighs a lot, and
| doesn't make sense to ship around the planet.
|
| Thus, people get foam, OSB, and cardboard in a fake canvas bag.
|
| Good upholsterers are hard to find, often eccentrics, and usually
| will not tolerate cheapskates. If you own something pricey like a
| boat or restaurant, than most are happy to get something that
| will last. Even a few yards of period correct fabrics or leather
| is more expensive than the typical Ikea living room set.
|
| One needs to learn these things if you want to stay married. lol
| =)
| UberFly wrote:
| I look through the antiques subreddit often and lots of really
| nice quality furniture is hardly valued now because it's out of
| style. A good quality sofa should be able to be re-foamed and
| fabriced forever but I think we're all just too mindset on cheap
| and disposable since that's the easiest route.
| gnicholas wrote:
| We bought some sofas secondhand when moving into our first home.
| They were great, and they held up well for many years. But
| ultimately we sold them and bought new ones because we didn't
| know if they had the fire-retardant chemicals that used to be
| mandated in CA (until they were discovered to be carcinogenic).
| The new sofa (from Costco) seems good but the sofa chairs (from
| Wayfair) are not so good.
|
| It seems like the frame in the back has some sort of support that
| is made out of a material that is closer to cardboard than wood.
| When our kids run into it, the back of the chair deforms a bit
| and has to be bent back. I have no idea why the frame of a chair
| would be made out of something so weak. I expect we'll have to
| replace them in 5 years or so, and we'll aim for something more
| old-school.
| 39 wrote:
| Wayfair is largely dropship trash.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Yeah we used filters to search for just solid wood (no MDF),
| but apparently even the "solid wood" stuff is still pretty
| flimsy.
| zachmu wrote:
| My leather sectional cost as much as a decent used car and it
| hurt to write that check, but it's definitely well built.
| maxglute wrote:
| Sofa bases seems to be getting shitter and shitter as
| manufactures value engineer with increasingly more low quality
| engineered wood. At this point my next sofa frame is going to be
| sturdy metal outdoor furniture. I've also seen a few tiktok
| sponcon videos of sofas with industrial plastic molded frame,
| like industrial pallets. Probably not enviromentally friendly,
| but seems durable.
|
| Seems like Sofas are last to make the economical steel channel
| furniture jump, you can get tons of sturdy/durable bedframes for
| like $100 shipped on Amazon. Most cheap metal futon frames also
| last forever if it wasn't for the moving mechanical components.
| I'd like to see more steel + bolt sofas.
| justinlloyd wrote:
| Last time I bought a couch, a new one, it set me back $6,000. It
| took me the better part of eight months to find it. Solid wood.
| Proper joinery. Thick padding. Pig skin leather. We kept it for
| 20 years before giving it to some friends who had it
| reupholstered where I expect it will last another 20 years.
|
| I used to have some expensive, but ultimately crap, book cases.
| Book cases are not designed by people who own a lot of books. 36"
| to 48" spans of fast growth pine will stretch and bow within a
| year or two. I designed my own book case. I went to a furniture
| making store. We went back and forth a few times. The biggest
| sticking point that took four attempts for the furniture maker to
| understand was where to put the fixed shelf. It does not go in
| the middle because that wastes space. We made it out of pine. 7'
| 8" tall, so that when standing it up, it will clear an 8ft
| ceiling in modern American homes. 22" wide shelves so they cannot
| flex. Fixed shelf to counteract gravity. Made specifically to
| carry paperback novels and similarly sized books. "Sand it three
| times, prime it, sand it, prime it, sand it, paint it, sand it,
| paint it, no I don't care that a single book case will cost
| $200." I bought 24 of them. Many hundreds of lineal feet of book
| cases. We still have them 24 years later and they are as good as
| new. And the paint job, because it is two layers of prime and two
| layers of paint, on a mirror surface, looks like you just took
| the item from the showroom floor.
|
| I have a plywood bookcase I made to store cooking books. The
| cheapest plywood you can imagine from the big box store. But
| because of the structural design, 15 years later it still holds
| up without any bowing or flexing.
|
| Modern furniture is absolute junk. Even the "good stuff."
| readingnews wrote:
| >> it set me back $6,000.
|
| The issue is that most modern households in the U.S. can not
| hack that kind of pricetag for a sofa / couch. Hell, I could
| never spend that kind of jack on a couch, even if I literally
| saved up for it (which would take years)... it is just far too
| much of a percentage of my income for one furniture item.
|
| So, how do we solve that issue (e.g. its good, but if it is 10%
| of your gross annual income, how could you afford it)? Either
| people need to get paid more, or ???
| mycologos wrote:
| I read a book about chairs a few months ago, and one bit from
| it is
|
| > Eighteenth-century furniture was expensive. At a time when
| a journeyman joiner earned three livres a day, a good-quality
| armchair might cost as much as a hundred livres.
| bombcar wrote:
| That's only 30 days work, which is in the $3-10k range.
|
| And for that you CAN get good furniture; the trick is
| figuring out you're paying for the quality and not just
| overpaying for junk.
| drchickensalad wrote:
| Yeah wow that's like $8k+ for an armchair in today's wages
| (including the historically inaccurate assumption they only
| work 8 hours too)
| photonthug wrote:
| > percentage of my income for one furniture item
|
| No matter how much money I make, I like to think there's
| price-tags I'd still balk at just because I don't want to be
| a sucker. Or get involved in status-signaling.. not sure
| which is worse.
|
| So I started thinking about comparisons also. I like to go
| back to cups of coffee, and you could spend 6 bucks on coffee
| easily.. is a piece of furniture worth a thousand cups?
| Maybe. On the other hand, you could own like 3 cargo
| containers for this cash (think of the material involved), or
| a used car (think of the utility!).
|
| So nah, this feels like way too much money, unless it's a
| mint condition antique that some king and queen used to sit
| on. A huge Belffin modular super sofa with 9 seats and 2
| ottomans is less than $2k.
| justinlloyd wrote:
| We drive a second-hand Toyota that we paid cash for. The
| previous car we racked up 200,000 miles before deciding to
| "upgrade." I wear worn out Skechers sneakers that have seen
| better days. The leather belt that holds up my pants is
| getting on for 20 years old. The red sweatshirt I am
| currently wearing is stained with paint and varnish and
| food, and has at least three holes in it.
|
| I pay, very rarely, for good coffee outside of the home. I
| prefer the coffee I make at home. It costs me around 8c per
| cup, 12c if I steam some milk. Some really good beans that
| cost around $25 a pound. Admittedly the coffee is made on a
| Jura X8, or a WEGA espresso machine at the RV.
|
| Nobody really comes in our house, so we're not status
| signalling to anyone other than this casual mention on
| social media about some stuff. Money is a tool, and
| deployed properly, can bring a lot of leverage to problems.
|
| You're free to make a judgement, and would probably blow a
| gasket knowing what I dropped on three office chairs, but
| at the end of the day, I used the tools I have at my
| disposal.
| justinlloyd wrote:
| We need to raise the living wage, and the living standard of
| our people. But that's a separate discussion. The couch was
| not 10% of my gross annual income.
| ejb999 wrote:
| If you simply raise wages, then the people that make the
| furniture will also have their wages raised - which will
| increase the cost even further - it doesn't solve this
| problem and may even make it worse.
| jonfromsf wrote:
| Just buy quality used stuff, it is almost free. Facebook
| marketplace is your friend. That guy with a truck is your
| other friend.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Ye old cinder block bookcase is probably the best, and the
| internet has a lot of good ideas.
|
| The old clay pipes used to be the best for those, look much
| better than cinder blocks, but whatever.
| p1nkpineapple wrote:
| Holy moly, 24 bookcases - that's more than my local library.
| What are your reading habits?
| justinlloyd wrote:
| My media consumption habits went off a cliff since the
| pandemic due to life circumstances. I am slowly picking up
| the pace again. I have read around 3,500 books, not all of
| which I keep on the shelves. A nearly complete list with
| reviews of many of them are on one of my personal blogs.
| waylandsmithers wrote:
| ...not to mention furniture stores seem to keep no inventory, so
| you get it 6-8 weeks after you buy because that's how it takes
| them to build and ship your new couch
| frankus wrote:
| One of the draws of the DTC model (and IKEA) is the apparently
| heavily commission-based pay structure of the sales staff of most
| brick-and-mortar furniture stores.
| MikeTheGreat wrote:
| This article about about sofas opens with "The most important
| piece of furniture in your home..."
|
| Did anyone else find this weird / funny?
|
| Like, just off the top of my head I'd put my bed at the top of my
| list, waaaay ahead of a sofa. Next might be the desk & chair I
| WFH at, and then it goes on from there.
|
| I get that the article wants to build engagement by "raising the
| stakes", but c'mon. Sofas are not that important :)
| pixl97 wrote:
| I get there would be some caveats here, but when it comes to
| furniture others see, for most beds and office chairs are down
| on the list. Of furniture guests are apt to see and use the
| sofa is pretty high up.
| illiac786 wrote:
| The cookie popup of this site is some dark design to behold, I
| have to say. You need to disable every single "goal" one by one -
| once you have figured out this is the least worst option. You can
| otherwise disable the 1400 partners one by one.
|
| This is completely illegal in Europe and I think it's illegal to
| serve this UI to an EU IP, even for non-EU websites.
|
| Anyway, who cares, it's almost funny what lengths they go to to
| get you to accept cookies.
| nytesky wrote:
| I surf things like this in incognito mode or Firefox focus,
| can't I safely accept all cookies and move on as they will be
| nuked in next session?
| askvictor wrote:
| Didn't notice a thing (using ublock origin with
| easylist->cookie notices)
| illiac786 wrote:
| I was using Safari iOS with AdGuard
| dojitza1 wrote:
| Second hand sofa market is surprisingly good in all cities ai
| lived in (Europe) You can get great stuff for less than 100eur.
| Good luck figuring out there transport and cleaning though.
| jonah wrote:
| I just spent about $700 having new cushions made for a 50+ year
| old Danish Teak sofa that I inherited from my grandparents. The
| original cushions were long gone, but the wooden frame was still
| in great condition.
|
| I sourced high-quality foam and wool upholstery fabric from
| Maharam and took those to one of the best upholsterers/furniture
| restorers in Los Angeles. They did a wonderful job and now I have
| a super-comfortable couch with many good childhood memories, that
| should last me another 25 years before I need to replace the
| cushions again.
|
| Point being, get a classic old piece and restore it. It will last
| a lifetime.
| andirk wrote:
| Is it super heavy? I've noticed weight often equals how long
| something will last in good condition, and old furniture is
| often way heavier and bulkier.
| analog31 wrote:
| Not the OP, but my family has a bunch of Danish teak
| furniture, as does my mom. The sofas are not super heavy.
| Cushions on a frame. You can see under it. Now, there's no
| bed inside. My mom's was re-upholstered once. Ours isn't old
| enough for that yet. We've re-upholstered the dining chairs a
| couple of times.
|
| As for other pieces of furniture, e.g., cabinets and stuff,
| we bought them used from a place that combed estate sales in
| Denmark for furniture and sold it in the US. One attraction
| is that the old furniture is smaller, so it works in a
| smaller house.
| jonah wrote:
| I also have my grandparent's danish teak dressers and
| dining table and chairs as well as some various side
| tables, lamps, bed, etc. I've acquired elsewhere. The all
| look wonderful and I get a nice feeling of connection to my
| family whenever I grab some socks, or sit down to eat, etc.
| nntwozz wrote:
| That's because old furniture is usually made of heartwood and
| not the cheaper sapwood part of the tree; I like to call it
| cardboard furniture.
|
| Same goes for old wooden windows etc. that can last a hundred
| years or more if properly taken care of.
|
| "Heavy is good, heavy is reliable. If it doesn't work you can
| always hit them with it." -- Boris 'The Blade' Yurinov
| ghaff wrote:
| >Same goes for old wooden windows etc. that can last a
| hundred years or more if properly taken care of.
|
| The key may be the "properly taken care of" part (or they
| didn't buy crap at the time part).
|
| I live in a greater than 200 year old house and all the
| older windows dating to whenever are complete crap compared
| to newer Andersens I've had installed.
| RogerL wrote:
| Survivorship bias. The cheap stuff doesn't last. "Take from
| the dresser of deal, Lacking the three glass knobs, that
| sheet..." - Wallace Stevens, 1922. "Deal" being cheap pine
| or other soft heartwood (in the poem he is trying to evoke
| a scene of poverty and maybe a bit of gaudiness). Not that
| buying old can't be an excellent strategy, it having
| survived either a long life, or perhaps it was just never
| used in which case all bets are off.
| byw wrote:
| I owned a bunch of mid-century Danish/Swedish furnitures, and
| they're generally pretty light. They tend to have slimmer
| profiles for the "modern" appearance, so less material. Also
| solid wood tend to be lighter than engineered wood.
| turkishmonky wrote:
| I'd be careful equating heavy with quality - MDF is extremely
| heavy but not great for longevity.
| jonah wrote:
| As others mentioned, it's quite light. Here are some pictures
| I found online of ones similar one to mine:
|
| https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a2/c9/50/a2c9506ff9f3d65541d5.
| ..
|
| https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZrMM8Wa1DuU/UkRPE9INzeI/AAAAAAAAC.
| ..
|
| I wrote my original post in haste - the cost was for doing
| the couch and a matching chair (same side-profile, just
| narrower.)
| tasuki wrote:
| I bought a used Nieri leather sofa recently for a seventh of
| the original price. It is supposed to be a solid high end
| sofa (or so the seller said; it was the most expensive sofa
| of the hundred they were selling), but is feather light. I
| was suspicious, but bought it anyway because I liked it. So
| far it has withstanded the kid jumping on it in various ways.
|
| I wonder, is it even possible it's solidly made despite being
| very light?
| verticalscaler wrote:
| Two points actually: Teak is great. How it gets around to being
| a sofa is not. This is a doubly good thing you're doing keeping
| it going instead of disposing of it like most people would.
| whateveracct wrote:
| I have a leather Benchmade Modern couch that has lasted half a
| decade no problem now. I think they switched facilities/materials
| at one point though ..but I got grandfathered into the real wood,
| better facility when I got my second couch (I called and asked)
| andirk wrote:
| Glad to hear everyone agrees that most couches are pretty subpar.
| I bought $10,000 worth of stuff from a high end furniture place
| because the French girl started working there. Then that boat got
| stuck in the Suez Canal, the shipping container finally arrived
| months late, and it was empty. So I got a full refund and she
| still got her huge commission, and after reading this the couch
| probably sucked.
| deeel wrote:
| This is a major issue we have found while building
| https://www.unwraplife.co/.
|
| We only list brands that are A) plastic-free and B) use non-toxic
| materials.
|
| The list of large-ish brands that fit those specifications can be
| counted on one hand.
|
| The industry is rife with corner cutting, greenwashing, and lack
| of disclosure.
| tptacek wrote:
| This article echoes something I've learned since we moved into a
| larger house this past summer: don't buy new furniture.+
|
| We bought very nice leather couches a few years back (we have
| dogs, leather is the only option) and paid dearly for them. And
| they're great. (We looked carefully at the construction details
| before buying.)
|
| This summer, we had some rooms we cared a lot about and others we
| just needed to fill in some blanks in, and we camped Facebook
| Marketplace looking for stuff. Pretty soon, even the living room
| was getting stuff we found on Facebook, at comparable levels of
| quality to our old "new" furniture, and at pennies on the dollar.
| People are simply always getting rid of good stuff, and there
| isn't a meaningful secondary market for it; they're just thrilled
| you're getting it out of their house and getting a couple bucks
| in the process.
|
| I submit that you would end up with a better-furnished room
| faster, more easily, and at a fraction of the cost of high-end
| furniture retailers simply with Facebook Marketplace and
| TaskRabbit (for near-instant delivery).
|
| + _Leastways, not if you live in a major North American metro._
| _xerces_ wrote:
| Are you not worried about bedbugs buying furniture off
| Facebook?
| verticalscaler wrote:
| Or ghosts? I mean if the house it comes from is haunted maybe
| an evil spirit will migrate with it. You never know.
| echelon wrote:
| I got pesky moths from getting something used once.
|
| It isn't worth the hassle.
| tptacek wrote:
| For me it's the other way around: anything I might want
| that's of reasonable quality will take 1+ months to
| arrive (usually, it'll have to be constructed to order),
| where I'm only a couple clicks away from having the new
| thing _the next day_ buying used.
|
| I want to be clear that I'm not saying everything on
| Facebook Marketplace is great. Most of it is crap! You
| still have to be discriminating. But everybody is always
| unloading high-quality furniture, and, at least for now,
| Facebook is full of excellent deals.
| bombcar wrote:
| https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2007/06/22/perfectly-
| reas...
| paholg wrote:
| I think bedbugs are a regional problem.
| BizarroLand wrote:
| I can't say I fully agree or disagree:
|
| https://www.mattressclarity.com/blog/bed-bugs-by-state-
| city-...
|
| It seems to be related to population density, at least in
| America, and only somewhat ameliorated by climate.
| TylerE wrote:
| That's just lazy lying with a map. They're just literally
| mapping population. If you controlled for population the
| signal disappears utterly.
|
| Look familiar?
|
| https://xkcd.com/1138/
| BizarroLand wrote:
| Do you have a link to an alternative site with
| information about bedbug density made since 2018 or so?
|
| I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying that in lieu of
| additional information this is what I have to work with,
| so I will need a better source of data before I change my
| mind.
| TylerE wrote:
| Just read the legend. It's raw numbers, not per capita.
| It's not even worth taking seriously.
|
| It's not showing _rates_ at all, just raw case numbers.
|
| NY has a lot. Alaska and Wyoming have almost none. Things
| happen where people live. News at 11.
|
| That site is also obvious affiliate spam SEO bait.
| BizarroLand wrote:
| Do you have a link to an alternative site with
| information about bedbug density made since 2018 or so?
| TylerE wrote:
| No, but again, the map you linked doesn't either. It says
| nothing about density of _occurrence_.
|
| That map would report 75x more cases in California than
| Wyoming, even if actual frequency was identically.
| maximus-decimus wrote:
| Just put the sofa in the dryer. But seriously, I wonder if
| there's some heat treatment possible. surely it should be
| possible and put the sofa in a giant plastic bag and heat
| the air inside or something.
| dazc wrote:
| The critical temperature for killing bugs is 60 degrees
| centigrade, not many sofas are going to withstand that.
| pierat wrote:
| Put it in a Uhaul box for a day in summer heavy sun. It
| already hits 160f / 71c routinely in summer in a closed
| vehicle.
|
| Ive done that when getting old wood furniture from
| facebook. We bake it for a day or 2 in a closed trailer.
| If there was anything living on or in it, it isn't after
| the bake.
|
| And the temp doesnt damage what we do that to in any way.
| squeaky-clean wrote:
| Bedbugs die much more easily than that, 45C for 90
| minutes will do it. The most expensive extermination
| method for bed and bugs is to seal up the home similar to
| the way it's done when using pesticides, except they just
| blast heat into your home for like 8 hours. Kills the bed
| bug infestation inside completely, but because there's no
| residual poisons bedbugs from outside can start a new
| infestation easily. It works great for homes, not worth
| doing for apartments.
| instagib wrote:
| My father went through a double bed bugs ordeal. The
| first try didn't work and he ended up throwing out nearly
| everything he had to get rid of them. Kids toys for the
| grandkids, furniture, mattresses, clothing, and basically
| started over like his house on the inside burned down.
| tptacek wrote:
| I would worry about stuff like that if I was buying cloth
| furniture. I am not worried about it buying high-end leather
| furniture. It seems about as likely as getting bedbugs from a
| used car (which also happens! but nobody blinks about buying
| a used car). You're generally buying from people's houses.
| Maybe I'd be concerned about grabbing something from an
| apartment.
| arp242 wrote:
| Few years ago I moved to another country and had to get rid of
| everything I had minus ~25kg.
|
| It's bloody hard to get rid of a _lot_ of stuff. I had a great
| leather sofa, about 15-20 years old (inherited from my
| grandparents) still in great condition, but I couldn 't get rid
| of it at any price and none of the charity shops took it
| because it was missing some fire hazard label (sigh...). Same
| with almost everything: I sold my 2-year old PS1,200 mattress
| for PS50 (and I had to practically beg to guy to take it,
| because it would have been a complete shame to chuck it).
| Washing machine, fridge, all the "little stuff" (cutlery,
| books, DVDs, what-have-you). I ended up putting a lot outside
| "free stuff" and that got rid of a lot.
|
| Actually the _only_ things I managed to sell was an IKEA
| sleeping sofa and an IKEA dinner table set.
|
| That said, since then I found that actually finding good stuff
| isn't always easy.
| gilfoy wrote:
| I've looked around for some quality used furniture at a
| decent price, it's very hard to find. Just gave up and bought
| some stuff on article.com which has been pretty ok bang for
| the buck for me in the past.
| freddie_mercury wrote:
| I've moved countries three times and that's been my
| experience each time.
|
| What's more, actually selling stuff is often such a time
| consuming hassle (posting, dealing with replies, scheduling
| pick ups, dealing with flakes) that in a lot of cases you're
| better off just paying trash hauling service to just come
| pick it all up in a single go.
| thrdbndndn wrote:
| I ended up having to discard a perfectly good desktop
| computer and a high-end scanner because nobody wanted them,
| not even for free. It's really frustrating, not because I
| missed out on making some money, but because of how wasteful
| it feels.
|
| However, monitors seem to sell immediately every time.
| TylerE wrote:
| The mattress one is a bit of an interesting one.
|
| It's actually illegal to sell a used mattress in the US - and
| there are very legitimate public health reasons for the being
| the case. You can't really clean one - that's especially true
| of foam, and they can be riddled with lice, bedbugs, and all
| kinds of creepy crawlies.
| neuah wrote:
| Regulations vary by state, but it is not in general illegal
| to sell a used mattress.
| arp242 wrote:
| People sleep in hotels, at friends, and whatnot. It's
| really not that big of an issue with basic due diligence,
| just like any second-hand goods.
| caligula1989 wrote:
| Once upon a time when moving countries people would pay for a
| shipping container... another unfortunate side effect of
| everything becoming shit - it's not even worth taking stuff
| with you.
| coopierez wrote:
| I found it very freeing when I moved country to leave
| almost everything behind. It really helps put into
| perspective what is valuable and what you know you would
| miss, and to reduce dependence and attachment on
| possessions. I think it has helped me become generally more
| minimalist in my life too.
| testingParisGPE wrote:
| What I find helpful with buying IKEA items second hand, I
| know the exact measurements and can find more infos online.
| With other furniture items, it much harder. And their names
| are distinct so I can just search for it.
| tonyarkles wrote:
| > People are simply always getting rid of good stuff
|
| I suppose there's an interesting survivorship thing going on
| here. A poorly-built couch probably won't even last 10 years.
| And if it does, somehow, you'll know as soon as you sit on it
| if it's about to turn into dust based on the squeaking and
| general instability. If it still feels solid and you don't sink
| into it so deep that you can't stand up again there's a decent
| chance it'll last another 10 years.
| api_or_ipa wrote:
| I suppose furniture also follows the [Lindy
| Effect](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect)
| tonyarkles wrote:
| Thanks! I couldn't remember the name of that!
| anon-sre-srm wrote:
| Learned this 30 years ago. Durable _quality_ goods are
| generally best bought used, but furniture requires close
| inspection to avoid pests.
|
| Custom Macy's extra long couch from ~2000 is the best thing
| ever. You sink into it and it holds up. Bought used-new for $1k
| when a friend paid $4k but was delivered 2 by mistake.
| KptMarchewa wrote:
| >(we have dogs, leather is the only option)
|
| Interesting, with cats it's exactly the opposite.
| jbluepolarbear wrote:
| Buying preowned furniture can save a lot of money. I bought a 4
| piece sectional couch, in great condition, for $600. The set
| originally cost $4500.
| al_borland wrote:
| When I moved to an area for work I wasn't planning to live long-
| term I ended up buying the cheapest sofa in the store. I think it
| was around $270. After a prolonged illness I grew more and more
| displeased with it, to the point that I went and bought a better
| one after I was better. I bought from a place that advertised the
| inside of the sofa more than the outside. It was all about the
| build quality and how long it would last. Ended up coming out to
| around $3k if I remember correctly, but it has a lifetime
| warranty on everything but the cushions, and even the cushions
| after 6-7 years of daily use are just now only starting to get to
| the point of feeling like they are beginning to break in.
|
| Quality can still be found, it just can't be assumed. I think
| that's the case for far too many things these days.
| scoofy wrote:
| I've been wanting to buy nice furniture for a very long time...
| unfortunately the housing crisis has prevented my from ever
| having a sense of permanence. If I had known I'd live in my
| last place for nearly a decade I would have purchased nice
| things, but as it stands, until I have a mortgage of my own, I
| refuse to spend good money on something I may need to replace
| next year.
| ghaff wrote:
| Sofas, perhaps especially, are pretty hard to fit for non
| built-in furniture. I bought a used sofa off my brother.
| (Ironically, their replacements ended up being terrible
| because they lasted about a year with their dogs.)
|
| I was also very lucky though. I thought I could configure the
| sectional in a couple different ways. Turned out I rolled the
| dice the right way because I couldn't. And only discovered
| this after many months because I was on crutches at the time
| and couldn't do anything about the sofa sitting in my garage.
| neilv wrote:
| I'm glad I'm not the only one.
|
| The buying up of precious housing as investments by non-
| residents should mostly be banned, starting with
| institutional and overseas investors.
|
| AirBnb should also be banned. And the people who profited off
| that startup, who must've known they were creating illegal
| hotels and destroying rental markets, should be hit with
| devastating fines, maybe also imprisoned.
| maxerickson wrote:
| We should just build lots of housing.
| BriggyDwiggs42 wrote:
| Lets do both :)
| maxerickson wrote:
| I really don't expect that appointing a committee to
| decide if your use of a space is acceptable is going to
| improve the problems caused in large part by having a
| committee decide how space should be used.
| gruez wrote:
| >The buying up of precious housing as investments by non-
| residents should mostly be banned, starting with
| institutional and overseas investors.
|
| What's the issue with them buying houses as investments, as
| long as they're being rented out? If that's the case, their
| net effect on the housing supply is zero.
|
| >maybe also imprisoned.
|
| I find it extremely disturbing that people are effectively
| demanding for bill of attainders for jail sentences for
| what are basically zoning violations.
| cdchn wrote:
| >What's the issue with them buying houses as investments,
| as long as they're being rented out?
|
| Because it prevents people from owning and now have to be
| permanent renters because of somebody's greedy rent
| seeking behavior.
| gruez wrote:
| Sounds like the actual problem is that landlords can
| engage in "greedy rent seeking behavior" at all. Allowing
| people to opt out, but only if they can afford a 6 figure
| downpayment and keep 7 figure amounts of their wealth
| parked in a single non-productive asset that's highly
| correlated with their job prospects is an imperfect
| solution to say the least. Everyone deserve protections
| from "greedy rent seeking behavior", not just the people
| who are in a position to buy.
| Repulsion9513 wrote:
| How does that happen when all the houses are being
| purchased as investments to rent out (or not, as often
| happens)?
| Spivak wrote:
| Good lord man what first time homebuyer is putting down
| $100k down payments? I just bought a nice house in a well
| established in demand neighborhood and my _total_ cost
| down was less than $30k. No assistance program, no
| special deal, definitely not a cheap house oof this
| market.
|
| Are you trying to buy 2M+ houses?
| mauvehaus wrote:
| Was your <$30K down a <20% down payment and are you
| paying PMI as a result? I totally understand that %20
| down is a big pile of money to conjure up, but PMI
| wouldn't have been cheap for us had we been unable to
| conjure it.
|
| Our cost to close was under $100k with a 20% down
| payment, but still substantial. And yes, we were first
| time homebuyers. Obviously we did not buy anything
| approaching 2M.
|
| With closing costs of $10k-15k, 100k doesn't even break a
| half million at 20% down. That's (sadly) not even table
| stakes in e.g. most parts of Boston.
| Spivak wrote:
| We were ready to drop 20% on the house because like you I
| was also scared of PMI but when we ran the numbers with
| the bank the cost was small enough that it didn't make
| one iota of difference in the long run so we paid 5% down
| and have a very flush emergency fund.
|
| Someone with good credit and currently renting would be
| nuts to "wait and save" for even 1 year because the total
| cost of PMI was like 6mo of our rent and accounting for
| paying it off over time with inflation it's probably even
| less than that in real dollars.
|
| Maybe we got lucky with PMI but googling a bit it doesn't
| seem that out of line with the calculators.
| Repulsion9513 wrote:
| Al Capone got a jail sentence for not paying his taxes.
|
| There's no bill of attainder involved when you break a
| law that existed before you were even born.
| jajko wrote:
| This is quite common trope here among young generation,
| feeling left out of property ownership like its some
| basic human right guaranteed by UN charter. Like previous
| generations were not left out of same/other stuff as
| well. That the post you respond to is not flagged tells
| you quite something... Too often these folks have
| outright communist mindset to set the world as it suits
| their current needs, which to somebody like me being
| raised in pretty hard oppression and practically slavery
| from russians is a proper insult.
|
| There are whole highly developed countries (higher than
| US for example in terms of personal freedom, ie
| Switzerland) who simply don't have home ownership as
| something usual and folks focus on actual quality aspects
| of living. Populations are consistently among the
| happiest (and healthiest) in the world.
|
| Correlation != causation but maybe not joining property
| rat race (which was always the case, just tools were few
| and apart for most) has some significant benefits. And if
| its just about safe investing then we moved topic
| completely elsewhere, back to good ol' universal greed.
| closeparen wrote:
| Countries where middle class people rent have pretty
| "communist" tenant protection regimes. Being perpetually
| 30 days from a potential eviction is not a position most
| people can or should be okay with.
| jajko wrote:
| Feels a bit pointless to explain basics but I'll bite for
| the others - I dont know which country is like that,
| definitely not Switzerland, not Germany, France, Czech
| republic nor Slovakia (listing personal multiyear
| experiences).
|
| Neither of them has any (significant) rent control,
| definitely abolute 0 for young and able, and people have
| rental agreements which run easily decade(s).
|
| Ie in France its the opposite - owners are properly
| scared of long term rentals, since rentees can trivially
| just stop paying and it will take you 6+ month of courts
| to have an attempt on evicion. They can trash the place
| and no real recourse. Not empty threat neither, everybody
| knows such a case personally. Thus everybody -> airbnbs.
| Blame the system if you grok the situation, french one is
| one of the worst in the west.
| watwut wrote:
| Slovakia and Czech Republic and Germany all have tenant
| protections. That is not the same as rent control, but
| you can't be kicked out randomly.
| cdchn wrote:
| Be careful what you say here about businesses that try to
| "disrupt an industry" aka "operate quasi-legally until
| someone tries to stop them."
| duped wrote:
| > starting with institutional and overseas investors.
|
| This would do next to nothing. The landlords buying up real
| estate are mom-and-pops with fewer than 10 properties.
| Which makes sense, because residential property is a pretty
| decent passive income that's only accessible to people with
| wealth but are not a good asset for large institutions.
|
| Otherwise banks wouldn't sell foreclosed homes at a
| discount, they'd hold onto them if it was more profitable.
|
| (1) https://www.housingwire.com/articles/no-wall-street-
| investor...
| Dah00n wrote:
| >The landlords buying up real estate are mom-and-pops
| with fewer than 10 properties.
|
| That might be true, but there are lots of companies that
| own more than 1000 homes. 1-3 should be the limit.
| duped wrote:
| You might want to read into data like this (1) to get a
| better view of how much housing stock those companies own
| as a proportion of the total market (it's very little).
| The data is kind of hard to get, because many small
| landlords have incorporated as LLCs/LLPs and they make up
| the bulk of "corporate" ownership.
|
| But it's pretty clear that the _big_ time owners like
| institutional investors /REITs/etc own less than 2% of
| all units.
|
| (1) https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R47332.pdf
| al_borland wrote:
| Airbnb was never meant to be what it has become. It started
| out as an easy way for people to rent out a spare room. The
| name "Airbnb" came from air mattresses on the floor.
|
| It's the get-rich-quick types who decided to be
| professional Airbnb landlords. Short term leases make no
| sense at all to anyone actual invested in rental
| properties, without something like Airbnb to back it. A
| long term tenant who pays on time should be the dream of
| every landlord, but with all the Airbnbs, it's not even
| considered.
|
| I don't know if this is the fault of the early investors,
| but I'm all for pulling the rug out from under the the
| people who own dozens of properties for the sole purpose of
| doing Airbnb. They are likely extremely leveraged, due to
| the low interest rates from years past, so they'd be
| screwed and be forced to sell fast.
|
| I agree on the international investors as well. Priority
| should always go to people who will actual live in a place.
| All those multi-million dollar places in NYC that sit
| vacant are a horrible. What's the point of housing if no
| one is there to live in it.
| ohialehua wrote:
| I'm 40 years old and trying to buy a home in a high COLA
| city with my partner and our child. We are currently
| renting. Everything is either absurdly priced or surrounded
| by people of color and crime.
|
| This realization has convinced me that it's not a supply
| problem. I go on Zillow and there's HUNDREDS of affordable
| condos and single family homes and 2 flats on offer. I can
| buy many of them cash. But they are in the ghetto. And
| ghettos are not some sort of act of god or timey-wimey
| opopsie-dasie. They are deliberate creations of a society.
|
| Similarly, I look on Zillow at houses in second-tier cities
| an hour or two drive and everything is reasonable. My
| partner and I work in person five days a week, and yet
| millennials and Gen Zers working remotely except for once a
| month have no legitimate reason to be in high COLA markets
| except for their love of marg towers.
|
| It's not a supply problem. It's an "I'm a racist white
| person and I'm okay with the carceral industrial complex"
| problem.
|
| All the crime I see in these areas that frankly makes
| living in them a threat to my female partner's survival is
| due to 60+ years of stupid welfare policy and 50+ years of
| the War on Drugs removing fathers from homes and
| incentivizing criminal culture.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| Good furniture holds value especially buying used good
| furniture. If it doesn't work out next year you can sell it
| for about what you paid if you haven't destroyed it. Hard
| wood holds up to abuse much better than the particle board
| stuff too.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Quality ain't cheap, and cheap ain't quality.
|
| In furniture, you definitely get what you pay for...or not.
| I've found anything <$300 is going to be nothing but fake
| materials like manufactured woods (if not even just veneer
| covered cardboard) and horrible cushion/fabric.
|
| Anything decent doesn't really start until ~$1k, and anything
| in the $3k range you mentioned starts to become heirloom
| quality. As with anything, these are YMMV, but serves as a fast
| basis for my experience
| resolutebat wrote:
| Unfortunately the premise of the article is that you can now
| easily drop $1k+ on a sofa that looks good on Instagram, but
| is constructed of particleboard and falls apart when you look
| at it sideways.
| bombcar wrote:
| You can drop way more than $1k and be stuck with something
| that's really kind of crappy.
|
| You have to know enough to know who is actually building
| the good stuff, and who is building good-looking marketing.
| dylan604 wrote:
| I have bought things online and been burned by the not
| know the who part. I'm now to the point that if it is
| anything I will be spending a lot of time _on_ , I'm not
| buying it unless I can see it in person. One vendor's
| medium firmness might be another's firm. Other furniture
| is less critical to me, so I haven't put the in-person
| only rule for that stuff
| al_borland wrote:
| In-person seems like it should be a hard requirement for
| anything a person will sit on. There is no way to tell
| anything just by looking at a picture.
|
| The sofa I got had one in-store that was cut in half at
| all levels, so the construction and materials could all
| be seen. Any company doing that is probably going to be
| pretty solid, and if not, it should be obvious.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > In-person seems like it should be a hard requirement
|
| _should_ but yet online sales of furniture is not a
| small market
| ghaff wrote:
| A lot of people these days are into the mode of order
| online. Certainly there are a ton of podcasts that offer
| deals on some of the online furniture companies. I don't
| think I'd personally do it but then my parents probably
| wouldn't have ordered a lot of stuff online that I do.
| (But furniture and big electronics appliances are
| arguably much more of a hassle to return than other
| things.)
| bombcar wrote:
| I'm actually much happier ordering appliances online vs
| furniture- because appliances I can evaluate in multiple
| ways that don't need me to sit on it.
|
| Unfortunately some very comfortable furniture turns out
| to not be long lasting, as I discovered, even when
| moderately pricey. Steel frame sofas can bend and break
| under repeated use because the steel is so thin - if you
| can bend it by hand, it will fail eventually.
| ghaff wrote:
| Well, yeah, appliances. Even if I order one at my local
| Lowe's, as I just did, it's not like I'm going to run a
| bunch of controlled dishwashing tests with it.
|
| Durability of furniture is harder to measure even if you
| try it out.
| dylan604 wrote:
| YMMV also includes adjusting for today's $. My $300 is
| today's $1k. So it still stands
| bradleyjg wrote:
| Did you last buy a couch in 1982?
| dylan604 wrote:
| Me? I haven't bought a couch. I'm on the same couch I
| grew up on at my parent's house that was bought circa
| 1978, so essentially, yes. Solid wood frame. Re-stuffed
| cushions. My couch can be found in those "If you
| recognize this, you're old" memes. AKA, I'm old
|
| Edit: re-reading almost reads if I'm still at my parent's
| house couch surfing. I'm not a zillenial. I'm in my place
| with that furniture from back then.
| bradleyjg wrote:
| I ask because $300 -> $1000 is roughly 1982 to today.
| oarsinsync wrote:
| I bought a leather sofa in 2012 that was priced at PS389.
| Today (2024) it's priced at PS899. -\\_(tsu)_/-
| m000 wrote:
| And it's not only sofas. People still conflate price with
| quality, and this is massively exploited.
|
| You can see that from the number of "small brand" insta-
| entrepreneurs. People will readily shell $80 for the latest
| trendy item they saw in a sponsored insta-ad, believing
| they're buying a branded product. In reality, it's the same
| $20-$30 item sold on TEMU, with a brand name slapped on it.
| ajsnigrutin wrote:
| > Quality ain't cheap, and cheap ain't quality.
|
| The problem here is, that expensive doesn't mean quality.
|
| Buying a cheap ikea piece and replacing it in a few years
| might still be a better choice than overpaying for an
| expensive piece, that's the same quality as ikea, but with a
| different tag on it (both 'brand tag' and 'price tag').
| Gigachad wrote:
| The ikea stuff also seems to be perfectly fine. Almost my
| entire apartment I ikea stuff and I'm yet to have anything
| fail. With some of the oldest bits being the Malm draws
| which are about 15 years old now and still perfectly fine.
|
| Sure, if you move them around a lot or leave them in the
| sun they will degrade, but just using them as normal they
| seem to last way longer than you'd think.
| doubled112 wrote:
| All my Ikea stuff has been perfectly fine as well.
|
| A photo fell off the wall and put a rather large hole in
| a Lack coffee table one time. We were pretty amazed that
| the photo frame won. It was a $25 table. I could buy many
| for the price of something nice.
|
| Having small kids around, and seeing how they play, learn
| to use a fork, etc, I feel like we made the right choice
| buying cheaper. Plus what kid doesn't want to play at the
| table mom and dad let them sticker bomb?
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| I still have the Lack end table I bought for $7 20 years
| ago.
| doubled112 wrote:
| At some point between then and now they changed how they
| made them. They have more empty space inside now.
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| I have seen people using these on YouTube as a server
| rack substitute. They are still frighteningly cheap after
| 20 years.
| VHRanger wrote:
| The problem with Ikea is once you have to move them
| around. Or if you have kids/dogs jumping up and down the
| sofa, etc.
|
| The particleboard connections aren't very sturdy.
| ajsnigrutin wrote:
| Well sure, but in many cases, you can go to a "proper"
| furniture store, buy a piece that is a couple of times
| more expensive than the one from ikea, and get the same
| particle board and same shitty connections... especially
| with stuff where the wood is hidden (eg. sofas).
|
| Also the assembly for ikea stuff is usually perfect..
| everything aligns to the last millimeter... which again,
| I can't say for much more expensive furniture pieces.
| VHRanger wrote:
| Agreed, there's a big gap between Ikea and the next step
| up.
|
| And most people can't differentiate between quality (nor
| should we expect them to!).
|
| "Proper" furniture stores you find in malls and outlets
| are generally high margin crap. There's lots of soft
| scams out there.
|
| There's a reason many people go back towards antiques and
| similar.
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| I feel like beds are in the same category. There is a sea
| of choice, but very hard to distinguish which is actually
| higher quality... or if the price difference has tangible
| benefits (better sleep, etc.).
| giantrobot wrote:
| IKEA stuff is also relatively easy to "harden" with some
| extra strategically placed metal brackets from Home
| Depot. For instance you can make a particle board
| bookshelf very sturdy by screwing some L-brackets on the
| back corners. Corner braces screwed under the shelves
| will likewise keep them from bowing under the weight of
| books.
|
| It's a few extra dollars and will make the pieces survive
| a move and just generally feel sturdier. It's not a
| replacement for "good" furniture but will make the cheap
| stuff much better.
| throwaway14356 wrote:
| yeah, add lots of glue and metal L profiles or some nice
| decorative wood. Good glue alone makes a better
| attachment than the screws and nails but you do have to
| glue it before it gets wobbly
| ornornor wrote:
| > the assembly for ikea stuff is usually perfect..
| everything aligns to the last millimeter...
|
| What? How?
|
| I've moved a lot in the last 15 years and always
| defaulting to ikea for convenience. "Fits together well"
| isn't what I'd use to describe their furniture.
| gruez wrote:
| >Also the assembly for ikea stuff is usually perfect..
| everything aligns to the last millimeter... which again,
| I can't say for much more expensive furniture pieces.
|
| Probably because the ikea stuff you bought tend to be
| particleboard and the "expensive furniture pieces" are
| solid wood. Solid wood tend to wrap/deform more due to
| moisture than particleboard, which means even if they're
| drilled with millimeter precision at the factory they end
| up not aligning when it reaches your house. From personal
| experience the solid wood furniture I got ikea were
| definitely not aligned "to the last millimeter".
| Hamuko wrote:
| When I was shopping for a TV console, I went to a
| "proper" furniture shop and checked out console in the
| 150 to 200 euro range. Zero consideration for cable
| management and doors slammed hard when you closed them.
| Then I went to IKEA and bought a BESTA system that
| totalled like 130EUR or something. Soft-closing doors,
| cable management holes and the lot. Was very happy with
| my BESTA after seeing what other stores had in a similar
| price range.
| ascagnel_ wrote:
| IKEA is highly variable. I'm writing this while sitting
| on a leather loveseat that's more than a decade old and
| holding up great. I also have a chest of drawers that,
| despite my best efforts during construction, immediately
| began to sag.
|
| Their expensive furniture is good mid-range stuff, the
| cheap stuff is cheap.
| OJFord wrote:
| Yeah the cheap stuff is on par with up to 10x cheaper
| stuff on Amazon (you just have to deal with drop shipped
| branding and dodgy/no instructions), the more expensive
| stuff has better quality competitors IMO.
|
| Such as Dwell.co.uk, coincidentally, completely unrelated
| afaict to OP. They make veneer-grade non-flat-pack
| furniture (and upholstered stuff) at a mid-high Ikea
| price. Made similar I think, or any number (including
| local showrooms) of suppliers of either drop shipped or
| wholesale manufactured oak+paint-grade, it seems quite
| common/popular. I have a couple of items from
| cotswoldco.com for example that have absolutely matching
| (but differently named) pieces available from an
| unrelated local independent shop, that I might otherwise
| assume had a small manufacturing operation too.
| pbowyer wrote:
| Dwell.co.uk is sadly now part of DFS, so whether the
| quality and range continues...
| OJFord wrote:
| I realise it's unclear because of the position in the
| sentence & my lazy phrasing, and doesn't read well, but
| that was capital-M Made, made.com. As in 'Similar to Made
| I think, [...]'. (Can't edit it now.)
| graemep wrote:
| This is part of the enshittification of everything.
|
| Not long ago you could be a good brand an rely on it being
| good. Now most of them are just charging for the brand and
| not providing higher quality.
|
| I am in the UK, I have also inherited Sri Lankan furniture
| from my parents and grandparents and I have lived there as
| well. The decline in quality is the same in both those
| countries. I guess it is global.
| AuryGlenz wrote:
| Yeah, that's the real problem. My wife bought a bunch of
| furniture a couple of years ago that was billed online as
| "solid wood." It definitely isn't. We ended up getting one
| piece for free because the one they originally sent and
| then the replacement were damaged. I pushed her to get a
| refund on it all but I think she had spent so much time
| looking for good stuff that she was just tired of it.
|
| It wasn't cheap. I believe the coffee table was close to
| $1,000.
| TylerE wrote:
| The entire problem is that "decently expensive, good quality,
| but luxury/fashion" largely doesn't exist any more.
| nijave wrote:
| In the U.S. you can drop ~$5k on a Williams Sonoma et al
| sectional and get a cheaply made piece of junk. I've been
| happy with Maiden Home for around the same price. Wirecutter
| (now NY Times) has a couple good couch-buying articles.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| We had an ikea klippan for around 10 years, and had to give it
| up when moving.
|
| During these 10 years I haven't sat on any sofa, be in office
| lobbies, hotels, showrooms, friends' home that made me feel
| like it could be a significant upgrade upon my 400 USD sofa.
|
| Sure that might not be usual, and I actually wouldn't recommend
| any other Ikea sofa in general (many were crappy when we were
| choosing ours). But price and marketting ("made in XXXX") is
| still only one factor in the wether the product will be any
| good.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| A chair is a chair unless you get an actual office chair, but
| even then everyone copied herman miller already. I've sat in
| five figure chairs and there isn't any magic there other than
| its provenance I suppose. So many of the cheap chairs being
| sold today are actually shameless copies of mid century
| design chairs that people still pay a ton of money for. You
| might as well pay literally a hundreth the price and get the
| same experience going generic eames.
| generic92034 wrote:
| On the other hand I bought the current sofa some 20 years ago
| for about 600 Euro and it is still performing like day one.
| Probably a design failure. ;)
| oa8wj435o8a23u wrote:
| I've purchased two sofas, one for $1200 from a trendy company
| and I returned it the day after it was delivered. And then one
| for $3500 from Design Within Reach that is absolutely terrific
| and built to outlast me. I'm not advertising for that store,
| I'm just agreeing that quality is still available but it was
| never inexpensive. Mentally I compare furniture to the quality
| of stuff my parents and grandparents had, and I remember that
| the couch my parents bought in the 90s cost $2000 then.
| gh0zt wrote:
| in my experience when it comes to sofas the old "buy cheap buy
| twice" holds true. there are reputable brands such as ligne roset
| for example. they are pricey bit if you can commit to buying and
| owning for > 15 years. owning a clam and a togo for more than ten
| years and the are basically like new. foam & fabric. i understand
| this might unaffordable to a lot of people but buying second hand
| can be a great deal on high end sofas.
| mikeInAlaska wrote:
| Any opinions on Ekornes sofa from Norway?
| mycologos wrote:
| My parents got one 15 years ago and it's still in great
| condition with no real effort on their part. I have no idea
| what has changed at Ekornes in that timespan though, for all I
| know they got acquired by private equity and turned to crap.
| Glyptodon wrote:
| I hate buying furniture because it's easy to tell that most of
| what's out there is utter junk, but not very easy to figure out
| what's at least decent but isn't super expensive. Or what's
| expensive but not just marked up.
| kiliantics wrote:
| This is how I've begun to feel about almost every consumer
| product out there these days. This "enshittification" of the
| bulk of the output of our economy puts so much burden on any
| discerning consumer to do all the research needed just to get
| some basic dignified standard of quality from whatever they are
| forking over hard-earned money for. It will soon make more
| sense to put all that time and money into producing these
| things yourself via some micro cottage industry. (Personally I
| already do this for a growing number of things.)
|
| It's really depressing that we have gotten to this point,
| seemingly the logical conclusion of the so-called efficient
| capitalist market.
| levocardia wrote:
| >There are absolutely sturdy, beautifully made sofas constructed
| in the United States. There are custom designer pieces made here
| or in France or Italy or Scandinavia, which tend to be
| prohibitively expensive for the masses. But low- and mid-priced
| sofas are a relatively new phenomenon, and, frankly, they often
| suck.
|
| But do they suck less than not having a sofa at all? I am a
| several-time-over beneficiary of cheap made-in-southeast-asia
| sofas. Shipped in a fridge-sized box right to my doorstep,
| assembled (by me) in ~15min, and perfectly serviceable. Is it up
| to the same quality level as a $5000 made-in-USA solid wood hand-
| woven twine-joinery (etc etc) masterpiece? No, but I couldn't
| have afforded that kind of sofa. And it didn't have to be hand-
| packed by a furniture transportation expert, and it didn't weigh
| 800 lbs.
|
| I don't really see the "loser" here exactly - broke grad
| students, college kids, people in rural areas, and starving
| artists win; workers in developing countries win (the furniture
| factory sure beats the rice paddies); Instagram-sofa tech bros
| win. And gilded solid wood sofa makers can always market to the
| rich, who can afford to spend several months' worth of my rent
| cost on a piece of furniture.
| hatthew wrote:
| The losers are the middle class who want something 2x the price
| and 2x the quality, not 10x the price and 3x the quality.
| btbuildem wrote:
| Twenty some years ago I used to work at a business that made and
| delivered sofas. They've got showrooms in key large cities in
| North America, fancy schmancy top end stuff.
|
| The factory was a real place; the frames were made of solid wood
| and plywood, there was a sewing floor and even one (incredibly
| kooky) person whose sole job was to stuff the pillows. This guy
| was in a little room full of feathers all day, and they'd follow
| him around to the cantina and bathroom like a cartoon character..
| but I digress.
|
| My job there for a while was to make the sofa legs -- that was a
| sixteen step process, and they didn't even trust me to glue the
| boards together, just to do the cuts and shape the pieces. Sand
| and stain and wax and polish, yes sir!
|
| They had a dedicated delivery crew, and what the article mentions
| about packaging is true -- things would be blanketed and wrapped
| up just the right way, then tetris-ed onto the truck. Sitting
| shotgun on that truck and hauling sofas up stairs and through
| various spaces was what I did after making the legs got too
| boring.
|
| These sofas sold for $3000 ~ $4000 and up, and that was at the
| break of the millennium. I think the cheapest chair they had was
| around $2000. I should really swing by the showroom and see how
| much these are now -- and whether they're still made like they
| used to be.
| hammock wrote:
| You can still get made in the USA sofas with real hardwood, not
| rubber wood, which is fine, or worse, soft pine or
| particleboard or OSB) North Carolina was and is the center of
| solid wood furniture), and they still cost several to many
| thousands of dollars, and they will still last 100+ years with
| a couple reupholsterings or so, but most furniture comes from
| Asia now and is sold for 10x less, and is not worth
| reupholstering, and you will be lucky if it lasts 10 years.
|
| The was a great company an old colleague of mine started called
| Interior Define that sourced custom furniture from China for a
| BluDot price but much higher quality, but they did not survive
| the pandemic and have since been sold in bankruptcy to a
| company that has reduced the quality to par
| nostromo wrote:
| Room and Board sells great sofas that are made in the US.
| We've been very happy with ours.
|
| It's made from solid wood and stuffed with real feather down.
| It's several years old now and has shown no signs of aging.
| bradgessler wrote:
| I recently cut open a heavily used R&B sofa and found 1"
| thick plywood used through the frame. It was solid.
|
| The down feather pillows didn't do well--lots of feathers
| made their way out of the pillow.
| illegalsmile wrote:
| I've never really enjoyed down cushions on a functional
| everyday couch. Feathers inevitably make they're way out
| of the pillow, through the cushion's exterior fabric and
| into your back/arm/leg/etc... or just around the room.
| They lose loft and aren't as easy to replace as say
| cutting a piece or two of foam and inserting those. My
| current couch has a down cushion on the top of the seated
| part and backrest and when they go I'll replace them with
| memory foam.
| jasondigitized wrote:
| Agreed. We researched a ton of sofas and landed on Room and
| Board. Super happy so far.
| caseyohara wrote:
| Room and Board makes very good furniture. When my wife and
| I moved into our new home a few years ago, we decided to
| invest in high quality furniture that would last decades.
| Originally we ordered a sofa from Interior Define that
| never arrived. Something wonky was going on with that
| company, many people never received their orders and they
| wouldn't issue a refund. Thankfully we were still within
| the window to do a chargeback.
|
| We have a sofa, coffee table, bed, nightstands, and some
| wall sconces from Room and Board. I am very impressed with
| the materials and build quality; I can tell everything will
| wear well and age nicely. Worth the investment, highly
| recommended.
| ipqk wrote:
| I just wish their designs weren't so staid.
| Spivak wrote:
| Wow you weren't kidding, those are absolutely hideous.
| And I thought IKEA furniture design was as minimal as it
| got.
| infecto wrote:
| Glad you mentioned this. When I did previous research
| before the quote that convinced me was that Room and Board
| couches have the highest resell value among furniture
| brands. I cannot find the source now but anecdotally it has
| appeared to be true.
| makestuff wrote:
| Yeah I have furniture from there mainly because it was the
| only showroom I could find that hide a wide selection + was
| mostly solid wood or veneered cabinet grade plywood.
|
| The TV stand I bought from there shows no signs of warping
| a few years later and has had a 70 pound TV sitting on it
| the entire time.
|
| The pricing was also pretty reasonable for solid walnut
| that was made in the USA.
| enthdegree wrote:
| I got a Room and Board 65" Jasper in Cognac Leather right
| before the pandemic. I thought I was overpaying and it
| ended up sitting in shipping for 4 months because of
| lockdowns. I was predisposed to hate the thing but it's
| become one of my most reliable large purchases. Very
| solidly built. The leather has held up perfectly in front
| of bright windows.
| morgante wrote:
| Their beds are also great. It's the only solid, high-
| quality furniture I've ever owned.
|
| It's not cheap, but easily much higher quality than
| anything else in the same price point.
| andrewl wrote:
| I had a very good user experience ordering from
| Dreamsofa.com. They answered questions quickly, sent
| swatches, then sent more swatches when I needed more
| information, and their shipping tracking and notifications
| were helpful and accurate. The two guys from the shipping
| company they worked with were very nice. And I'm very happy
| with the sofa.
| boringuser2 wrote:
| A lot of meh furniture that uses steel will last, too.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| I like steel in furniture, especially for larger items like
| bookshelves - you get the level of rigidity that you can
| only get from very expensive and massive chunks of
| hardwood.
|
| Also it's light, and makes moving much easier
| lostlogin wrote:
| > larger items like bookshelves
|
| I'm a huge fan of Lundia shelving. It seems to be strong
| enough to hold anything, it's adjustable, comes in
| millions of sizes and looks good imho.
|
| https://lundia.com/
| MrDresden wrote:
| Strange, I remember hearing something about them going
| bankrupt not so long ago.
|
| Hope they haven't been revived by a VC fund that lacks
| their vision of quality and long lasting furniture.
| boringuser2 wrote:
| Worst case scenario it bends (this takes a lot of abuse)
| rather than snaps like plywood.
| cherrycherry98 wrote:
| Bought our sectional from a Bassett showroom almost 10 years
| ago. Extremely comfortable and the thing still looks brand
| new. Checked a few items on their website and found that
| they're still made in North Carolina.
| ecliptik wrote:
| We have a Bassett sectional going on almost 10 years too.
| Family friend'd mom worked for/with Bassett and got us a
| B2B price somehow - only caveat was I had to pick it up
| myself at the distribution warehouse in LA.
|
| It's a fun memory renting a box truck, driving to the
| industrial heart of LA while listening to Will Wheaton
| narrate "Masters of Doom" to pick it up.
| jseliger wrote:
| _The was a great company an old colleague of mine started
| called Interior Define_
|
| My wife and I have one of their sofas--it's quite nice,
| although our lives might've been easier with one of the
| Burrow-style sofas that are easily disassembled for moves.
| linsomniac wrote:
| >or worse, soft pine or particleboard or OSB
|
| Having done a lot of DIY projects over the last decade, I've
| really shifted my view of OSB. Originally I would lump it in
| with particleboard, but I've since drastically changed my
| view of it. Particleboard is, truly, junk. OSB and plywood
| are both pretty good products, and for some uses superior to
| hardwoods (dimensional stability, for example). High quality
| plywoods are amazing products. OSB for structure or
| underlayments are really quite good.
| Wohlf wrote:
| Particleboard is absolutely useless, MDF is mostly useless
| except using as a guaranteed flat surface on top of
| something to support it, hardboard is pretty useful in
| certain applications though. OSB is great and extremely
| affordable as sheathing, and there's a massive variety of
| plywood that's great for their respective purposes - from
| cheap rough sheathing, mid-grade for shop projects and
| filling large gaps in furniture, all the way up to
| beautiful and supremely strong Baltic birch.
| teleforce wrote:
| Avoid particleboard like a plague if you can afford it,
| appparently most of IKEA products now made of these since
| they are widely being used in dirt cheap furniture
| construction. They melt like ice once in contact with
| water. Recently, just had to chopped off all four legs of
| a bookshelf then replaced them with metal legs. The
| bookshelf legs somehow got damaged in contact with
| accumulated air-cond water droplets.
| Symbiote wrote:
| Ikea has two or three price points for each product. The
| cheapest will be made from chipboard or even cardboard.
| The most expensive varies, it might be pine or even
| something better.
| sgc wrote:
| I bought their highest end leather couch with a fold out
| bed a couple years ago, due to time constraints. I was
| very unhappy to see it was made from chipboard. Of course
| their shelves and such you can see what you are buying,
| but I would not trust anything upholstered myself.
| Symbiote wrote:
| Indeed:
|
| > Frame: Plywood, Polyurethane foam 30 kg/cu.m.,
| Particleboard, Solid wood, Fibreboard
|
| An example of something that looks well-built is the
| Skogsta dining table [1].
|
| > Table top: Solid acacia, Clear acrylic lacquer, Clear
| lacquer
|
| > Leg/ Rail: Solid acacia, Acrylic paint
|
| (Though the oak version, which costs more, is oak-
| veneered particleboard.)
|
| Many Ikea things aren't designed to last. That table has
| cross-beams, so it has a better chance surviving a party
| where someone leans heavily against one end of it.
| Something like Morbylanga [2] looks like it would
| collapse.
|
| I would give the furniture on display a good shove to see
| how sturdy it is.
|
| [1] https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/skogsta-dining-table-
| acacia-704...
|
| [2] https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/moerbylanga-table-oak-
| veneer-br...
| didon wrote:
| I actually have the Morbylanga table at home and I find
| it very sturdy. One thing which the pictures doesn't show
| is that there are two supporting beams under the table,
| which provides the necessary strength to not collapse on
| first touch. Obviously, I have not done the actual test,
| but I will try to remember and report back if the table
| ever breaks.
| Naracion wrote:
| Tangential, but if your table doesn't break in the next
| few days then you won't be able to report back, since
| editing and replying to comments get disabled after some
| days. I don't know what the exact time frame is like
| though.
| omnibrain wrote:
| There are a few things that are ok to robust. * EKORRE,
| the Rocking-moose is indestructable.
|
| * Furniturewise the bathroom furniture, especially
| GODMORGON are ok. I think because they have to survice
| contact with humidity.
|
| * The HILVER bamboo legs are that good, that we kept them
| even after getting rid of the cardboard table tops.
| monknomo wrote:
| I feel like the thing to do is to give whatever you are
| looking at in the showroom a pretty good shake, and to
| sit down on it hard. If it's creaky or loose at all
| there, it'll fall apart in no time at home
| sgc wrote:
| For now it is holding up and "feels" sturdy after a
| couple years, but I have no doubt it will fail at least 5
| years before I would otherwise expect it to (I would want
| 10 years, but now expect 5). My fault for trusting Ikea +
| higher end = good without further verification.
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _their shelves and such you can see what you are
| buying_
|
| no you can't, the outside shell of each shelf completely
| hides what's inside. I wanted to reconfigure a shelf
| (turn it on it's side, combine it with another) and turns
| out the "boards" are hollow. There is something inside at
| the corner pre-drilled-screw anchor points, but that's
| the only place you can attach something, the rest of it
| is potemkin shelf. You get to see this in more detail if
| you keep a shelf in a mildly humid place like a
| beachhouse, as the whoe thing delaminates and you see
| cardboard honeycombs inside a thin veneer of ...veneer
| yencabulator wrote:
| One of the things that complicates this conversation is
| that people who are huge fans of some specific Ikea
| furniture model bought it X years ago, and in the
| meanwhile its construction methods have switched to
| something cheaper. The "same" product can be both good
| and bad, depending on the year it was made.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| IKEA's cheapened their offerings quite a bit over the
| years. Pre-pandemic, used to be you could buy a solid
| wood butcher block and solid wood cabinet doors and
| fronts. Now? The butcher block is particleboard with end
| grain themed veneer and the closest to solid wood cabinet
| hardware you'll get is a set of bamboo drawer fronts.
| bayindirh wrote:
| I have their solid wood butcher block (made from prisms
| of solid wood glued together) and a _countertop_ made
| from the same material. When oiled to given instructions,
| both are pretty indestructible under normal use.
|
| It's very sad that they're not made anymore. I guessed it
| just was not imported here due to its prohibitive cost,
| but not being able to find it on the other side of the
| pond is saddening.
| onlypassingthru wrote:
| Ikea _used_ to have price points for each product. It was
| my goto for butcher block countertops but they have since
| transitioned to offering only crappy all veneer
| spongeboard.[0]
|
| [0]https://www.ikea.com/us/en/cat/butcher-block-
| countertops-464...
| swayvil wrote:
| Just finished a walkin closet cabinet (from kits)
| installation. All walls, floor to ceiling, veneered
| particleboard. Heavy, fragile, crumbly, weirdly hard.
| Rather nope. Blame the client.
| lostlogin wrote:
| > Particleboard is absolutely useless, MDF is mostly
| useless except using as a guaranteed flat surface on top
| of something to support it
|
| Unless there is a drop of moisture, then you throw it all
| away.
|
| It's so depressingly wasteful.
| jspash wrote:
| I could be wrong, but isn't MDF basically made from the
| waste of wood products? I mean, it's graded and
| standarised. But MDF _is_ the waste. So to waste it again
| is no great loss.
|
| But as with all things, I'm certain some producers are
| using raw/virgin materials. Probably from wood that is
| dirt cheap.
| samtho wrote:
| MDF is an engineered product comprised of homogenized
| hard and soft wood pulp, binding agents. It is dehydrated
| and pressed together to create a material that is of
| higher density than fiber board.
|
| The amount of sawdust needed to create a sheet of this
| stuff is astronomical compared to the output, not to
| mention the manufacturing process being very resource
| intensive. You also cannot just take bags of sawdust from
| the wood mill - it must be macerated and ground to a very
| fine dust with roughly the consistency of flour.
|
| The main advantage it has is that it is heavy (to weigh
| down furniture) and very easy to cut with bandsaws,
| mills, lasers, etc because of its uniform distribution of
| its constituent parts. It's also good for applying vinyl
| wraps and edging which is one reason why arcade cabinets
| are often made from it.
|
| All this for a product that is roughly the same price as
| A cabinet-grade ply:
|
| MDF 3/4" x 4' x 8' for $52.98:
| https://www.homedepot.com/p/3-4-in-x-4-ft-x-8-ft-MDF-
| Panel-D...
|
| Radiata Pine plywood 23/32" x 4' x 8' for $55.98:
| https://www.homedepot.com/p/23-32-in-x-4-ft-x-8-ft-
| Cabinet-G...
| linsomniac wrote:
| I ended up doing MDF tops for my workbench (1" MDF over
| 3/4 plywood), and finished them with shelac for a
| protected, low-friction surface. It is still vulnerable
| to water damage, but not as bad as unfinished, and as a
| spoil layer it's not bad. It has plusses and minuses.
| verisimilitude wrote:
| If you ever need to replace that MDF, try this:
| https://epoxytops.com/phenolic-resin-countertops/
|
| I'm using it for my next workbench top.
| amerine wrote:
| Oh neat!! Thanks for showing me this
| ajb wrote:
| I think that's similar to what my kitchen worktop is made
| of. It's great, but cutting it at all is a big job. It's
| incredibly hard.
| jeramey wrote:
| Seconded! I recently built a large 50" x 90" work surface
| in my garage and used MDO sign board (another phenolic
| resin product, not much more expensive than MDF and
| available at many construction-oriented lumber yards) for
| the top surface over top of a hardwood plywood subsurface
| and heavily milled Douglas Fir legs and trusses, all
| doweled and glued together. I've been quite happy. It was
| easy to use a router on to make channels for t-tracks,
| and has been quite stable for the past 6 months or so
| through the fall, winter, and spring weather changes with
| only an oil-filled radiant heater to keep things from
| getting too frigid.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Unless there is a drop of moisture, then you throw it all
| away.
|
| You might not want to set foot in your kitchen or
| bathroom then. Generally speaking cabinets (in the US)
| use particleboard frames. Higher end stuff will use
| plywood.
|
| I went with IKEA's Sektion cabinets to replace some forty
| year old particleboard cabinets that warped after years
| of water damage from a burst pipe. They came with a
| twenty-five year warranty so there's clearly some
| expectation of longevity.
| ajb wrote:
| Those are normally coated in melamine, even the edges,
| hence the ability to use them in a wet area. Ironically
| standard worktops are only coated on the top, so those
| can take damage.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| That's true of pretty much anything made of particleboard
| though.
| derefr wrote:
| ...which means MDF is fine if it's entirely clad in a few
| mm of something more water-resistant, with the MDF just
| serving as structural infill. (This is how most kitchen
| cabinetry is made. And they put up with the steam from a
| pot boiling below them just fine.)
| rootusrootus wrote:
| MDF for structural anything? That seems surprising, it's
| really weak and prone to sagging, and quite heavy. It's
| about the last thing I'd want to hang on a wall.
| duffyjp wrote:
| Our kitchen countertops are MDF covered in some sort of
| laminate. The laminate is great, but the MDF is swelling
| over our dishwasher and looks hideous. I'd be careful
| near moisture even if it's covered.
| EraYaN wrote:
| MDF is also great if you need homogeneous materials (for
| stuff like speaker cabinets). And for those more than
| sturdy enough, they are also always protected by some
| layer.
| alexey-salmin wrote:
| OSB is durable but you still need to be wary of
| formaldehyde in your home
| doublesocket wrote:
| There's a good choice in formaldehyde free boards these
| days. In the UK a popular one is Sterling Zero.
| iamtheworstdev wrote:
| Agreed. The range on plywood is pretty drastic and most of
| us only use the bad stuff. I wonder how many of us with
| homes made in the last 20-30 years realize that most of our
| joists are engineered joists made of plywood (basically
| wooden I-beams).
| throwway120385 wrote:
| The alternative is usually a truss which tend to bounce
| like a trampoline over long spans. The engineered
| I-joists are really good, and the rim joist from the same
| company is ridiculously tough.
| _heimdall wrote:
| The sheer amount of glue used in OSB and other manufactured
| sheet wood is pretty gross unfortunately. They are
| functionally useful for certain use cases, I just can't get
| myself to reach for it over real lumber and joinery.
| jorts wrote:
| Why does the glue concern you?
| bhickey wrote:
| Off gassing. Plywood is a big VOC emitter.
| kansface wrote:
| Its carcinogenic.
| _heimdall wrote:
| Others touched on it too, but I don't like all the
| chemicals in the wood or all the energy required to make
| it.
|
| If I'm building something I try really hard to avoid it,
| I can only assume the dust is really toxic to breath in
| and I don't have money or space for a fancy dust
| collection system.
| wouldbecouldbe wrote:
| The issue with OSB, unless you get the ECO one, is the
| formaldehyde. It's basically pieces wood glued together.
| And generally bad for air quality. A few might be okay, but
| I've seen entire startup buildings covered in it.
| anthomtb wrote:
| I recently put shelving up in my garage and could not
| convince myself to use anything other than OSB. It was just
| so damn cheap - half the price of any plywood for the same
| thickness. The only cons are the appearance and screw
| holding ability (but its sitting on brackets so the latter
| doesn't matter much).
|
| Baltic birch would be stronger, no doubt, but that's 3
| times the price and I am not exactly storing a geode
| collection up there.
| pubby wrote:
| OSB is much more nuanced than particle board, often in a
| bad way. Many manufactures orient the chips along a single
| axis, meaning it shares the anisotropic properties of solid
| wood where the X axis has a different strength and
| expansion rate than the Y axis. And looking at the 3rd
| dimension, the Z axis is actually quite weak. If you glue
| something to the face of an OSB board, you can break the
| joint fairly easily because the individual chips pull out.
| sarchertech wrote:
| We bought 2 Stickley sofas made in North Carolina. They cost
| close to $10k a piece.
|
| You can still get quality, you just have to pay for it.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| >and you will be lucky if it lasts 10 years.
|
| I have at least 20 various pieces of furniture from IKEA that
| have lasted more than 10 years, some even closing on 20, even
| after multiple moves to various college dorms. Dresser
| drawers, dining table, sofa, bed platform, sit stand desk,
| etc.
|
| I do not think I have ever thrown something out for breaking.
| Maybe gets scuffed or scratched up or chipped, but you can
| mostly use one of those latex paint touch up markers and make
| the damage nearly invisible.
| cdchn wrote:
| IKEA products seem to vary wildly between "partical board
| disposable" to "made from actual wood and somewhat decent."
| Doxin wrote:
| IKEA sells many products in a couple tiers. E.g. if you
| get the cheapest billy bookcase it'll just about barely
| hold up if it's full of books and you don't nudge it. If
| you get one of the more expensive models it'll be
| surprisingly sturdy instead.
|
| Same sort of thing applies to nearly all their products.
| Yes they sell cheap crap -- that still serves its purpose
| mind you -- but they also sell slightly more upscale
| furniture that'll actually survive a couple decades.
|
| And it's not like going for a "normal" furniture store is
| any guarantee either. My previous couch was from a
| regular furniture store and it broke right in half at
| around the 5 year mark. Upon inspection one of the cross
| members was significantly tapered, still had bark on it
| and everything. On one end it was a solid 2x4, on the
| other it was barely a 0.2x0.4.
| Hamuko wrote:
| And even the cheapest crap you can get from IKEA doesn't
| seem that bad to me. I've had one of those 5-euro LACK
| coffee tables for around six years and it really only has
| some minor surface damage on the top. Far away from
| throwing out.
|
| Although at the same time, I think I'm on my third MARKUS
| chair because of the gas spring leaking. Thankfully they
| do have long warranties, so you can exchange them if it
| doesn't last for 10 years.
| planede wrote:
| FYI you don't necessarily have to throw away an otherwise
| good office chair if the gas spring is leaking. You can
| replace just the gas spring.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| Repair skills in the west have all but disappeared
|
| I was able to fix quite a few items of furniture and
| electronics recently, but if you add cost of parts and
| labour of a professional, it's just cheaper to replace
| maayank wrote:
| Oh man... need to check my chair :(
|
| How did you discover this?
| Hamuko wrote:
| There was a black puddle under my chair.
| MikeDelta wrote:
| You could even hang some servers underneath your LACK,
| aka the LackRack [0]
|
| [0] https://wiki.eth0.nl/index.php/LackRack
| xp84 wrote:
| This is hilarious, but I can't imagine relying on 4
| screws into the cheapest wood known to man, all at the
| one end, holding up a heavier rackmount server without it
| sagging dangerously. On the other hand, I can imagine two
| LACKs stacked, with the servers on top of the bottom
| table, their weight being borne by all 4 legs evenly, and
| just mounted to the legs of the top table just to hold
| them securely in place. Anyway, thanks for sharing that
| awesome link!
| Symbiote wrote:
| It depends how well you treat it. Someone fidgety putting
| their feet on a EUR5 Lack table is enough to ruin it, as
| the connection between the legs and the tabletop is just
| double-ended screws.
| darkwater wrote:
| > IKEA sells many products in a couple tiers. E.g. if you
| get the cheapest billy bookcase it'll just about barely
| hold up if it's full of books and you don't nudge it.
|
| Agree, but still I just replaced a Billy bookcase that
| was over 15 years old and moved in 5 different places
| with me. It was really ugly looking in the end, and due a
| replacement. But even Ikea in more recent Billy they
| replaced metal parts for plastic ones and the "wood"
| seems even worse.
| mangodrunk wrote:
| BILLY bookcases are very sturdy, have you seen problems
| with them? I do recommend the thinner ones over the wider
| ones because the wider ones tend to sag in the middle if
| you have a lot of weight on them.
| salad-tycoon wrote:
| I agree with the comments below but would like to add that
| the IKEA of 10-20 years ago is not the IKEA of today. Many
| of their product lines have been made "more eco friendly"
| per their argument but in reality are cost saving measures.
| E.g wood countertops are veneer now and other things that
| you could buy as solid wood are veneer.
|
| You got in when the going was good. I think you can still
| buy decent enough stuff but having moved a few times myself
| and then friends and family a lot of the newer stuff is one
| time use, don't pick it up, don't look at it cross eyed,
| kinda stuff and it shows.
| thesaintlives wrote:
| More agreement! Ikea 20 years was twice the material you
| get today. Products could be taken apart and put back
| together multiple times. Not so today. Put together once,
| modify it if you want it to stay like that and if you
| really have to move it cross your fingers!
| acomjean wrote:
| I have some 25 year old ikea that's lasted well. Some was
| even solid wood and surprising nice( good quality hinges
| and laminates) But I haven't gotten anything recent.
|
| But I will say isn't the last step in the assembly
| process the 10% probability that you'll have to do some
| disassembly to reverse a piece that's not quite put
| together correctly?
| emodendroket wrote:
| > You can still get made in the USA sofas with real hardwood,
| not rubber wood, which is fine, or worse, soft pine or
| particleboard or OSB)
|
| Where? I went around furniture stores and found it hard to
| discern any relationship between price and quality.
| nerdjon wrote:
| I used to live in North Carolina, and some of the outlet
| stores for furniture are insane. Still expensive but compared
| to what I would get anywhere else for the same price quite
| good. Hickory in particular with all of those chair statues
| everywhere.
|
| I have long been thinking about the idea of saving up for a
| while and doing a big re-furnish trip down to North Carolina
| with a moving truck.
| bushbaba wrote:
| rubber wood IS hardwood, not sure why you'd ding it. It's a
| more eco-friendly wood choice
| ineedaj0b wrote:
| It's soft, dings easily
| creer wrote:
| I was mentioning in another thread, seeing good furniture
| made with engineered finger-jointed wood - which looked
| perfectly nice after finishing and felt super solid. A middle
| ground probably: not hardwood but very consistent,
| inexpensive and available by the mile. Probably with a hard
| finish on it.
| gexla wrote:
| Please give us an update on how stuffed pillow guy is doing
| these days.
| selcuka wrote:
| He stopped cheating at poker, so they set him free.
| theendisney wrote:
| It was some how relevant. I had a similar job making sofas in
| similar price range. We also had a crazy person stuffing
| everything. I asked why his job was not in the normal task
| roulation. They said for that job you have to be insanely
| strong, have insane endurance and you have to be insane. The
| guy tried it one time. How hard could it be? After 3 hours he
| literally couldnt lift his arms.
| bondarchuk wrote:
| > _They said for that job you have to be insanely strong,
| have insane endurance and you have to be insane._
|
| Lmao. There's some jobs like that. Always heard (less
| surprisingly maybe) the morse code operators on ships tend
| to be kooky as hell too.
| tacocataco wrote:
| There is probably a certain kind of person that is
| interested in communicating with beeps and boops.
| rlonstein wrote:
| When I was in grad school I accidentally wandered into the
| workshop for Montauk
| (https://montauksofa.com/collections/sofa/montauk/) with my
| girlfriend. They were very polite and I took their card. A few
| years later when I had some money, and my girlfriend was my
| wife, I still had the card and we bought one. More than twenty
| years since we still have it and it's just starting to get to
| where some of the cushions need the down stuffing refreshed.
| Quality.
| BenFranklin100 wrote:
| Gorgeous design.
| btbuildem wrote:
| How did you accidentally wander into their workshop? That
| place was in a random industrial zone off the 20 somewhere
| near Point St Claire.. Also super spooky, how did you know I
| was talking about them?
| TylerE wrote:
| He didn't, you just accidentally doxed yourself.
| rlonstein wrote:
| I remember we were staying in a hotel Ibis in a cheap part
| of the city (I was still in grad school), not sure where
| now we went a few times. The hotels are now Travelodge, I
| think. We are avid walkers so we went down Rue Sherbrooke
| and angled toward the water and just stumbled onto it. It
| was sunny and the craftsmen had the doors open. So we went
| in just to see.
|
| How did I know? I didn't. But it related to my own story
| about buying the one really high-quality piece of furniture
| I own.
| lambic wrote:
| I also have a 20+ year old Montauk. I had the cushions
| replaced a couple of years ago because they don't offer a
| restuffing service. Not cheap, but should keep me going for
| another 20 years.
| karim79 wrote:
| > things would be blanketed and wrapped up just the right way,
| then tetris-ed onto the truck.
|
| *tetris-ed and Sokoban-ed onto the truck
|
| (Sorry, couldn't help myself)
| m463 wrote:
| I think the problem I've noticed is - the furniture that is
| built to last very frequently fails the partner test - "that
| looks like old fart stuff".
|
| Same sort of issue with cool remote controls. For example, la-
| z-boy has pretty good controls - remotes have better designs,
| have lots of adjustments, and motors seem to move faster. And
| they too fail the partner test - "that looks like old fart
| stuff"
|
| I kind of like some stressless recliners.
|
| oh, there is one class of furniture that has a lot of control -
| the massage chairs. Except they seem to be furniture you want
| to hide from everyone, they fail the "normal human being" test.
|
| maybe I need to know pointers to other furniture/designs?
| namaria wrote:
| Partner sounds like a fashion victim. If social media
| consumption is making one's taste fond of low quality flashy
| crap I'd say grow some critical thinking skills.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| I mean... not really. Quality and style generally are
| pretty correlated, with higher quality pieces traditionally
| being more "old school". And that was basically GP
| comment's point.
|
| One can value form over function, especially if there's a
| specific style that the rest of your house uses. If your
| entire house is decorated in a contemporary style, then a
| traditional sofa is just going to stand out like a sore
| thumb.
| namaria wrote:
| This whole thread is about overpriced crap that sells
| because people don't know better. And if one's partner
| prefer flashy crap to quality stuff by calling quality
| stuff "antiquated" because it doesn't conform to styles
| peddled in social media and are devoid of fundamental
| quality well... that's not a conflict of taste, that is a
| story about choosing flashy crap for the sake of
| flashiness. Which doesn't seem defensible to me.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| Uh... what?
|
| I already said "One can value form over function". Each
| person has different needs and wants out of their
| furniture. Just because _you_ don't value form doesn't
| mean it's some unbelievable or "indefensible" concept.
|
| I don't want my house to look like it came out of the
| 1920s. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
|
| If you think otherwise, then more power to you, but don't
| hoist your beliefs and preconceptions on others.
| namaria wrote:
| You're playing off a false dichotomy. Furniture doesn't
| have to look bad to be of quality.
|
| GP said > I think the problem I've noticed is - the
| furniture that is built to last very frequently fails the
| partner test - "that looks like old fart stuff".
|
| This is a problem of taste alignment, not of preference.
| A person having a taste for the generally poor quality
| well marketed bit of goods available.
|
| So, like I said. If one develops a taste for a certain
| type of trendy furniture that is poorly made, it's a
| personal limitation.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| I very clearly articulated the _general correlation_
| already and never claimed it is a dichotomy. That is
| entirely on you.
|
| Just because you don't agree with someone's preferences
| does not mean they're wrong. I hope one day you're able
| to understand that, because you clearly don't.
|
| Until then, we have nothing more to discuss.
| namaria wrote:
| You're right. This is pointless because we're talking
| past each other.
|
| I say it's wrong to buy expensive crap because it's
| flashy and well marketed, and equally wrong to dismiss
| things that don't fit the aesthetics peddled under this
| model. It's wasteful consumerism, one of the most wrong
| things with society right now. It's killing the planet.
| In a word, indefensible. There absolutely are
| fashionable, beautiful, durable options.
|
| You say I am a bad person for having this opinion.
| "Hoisting" my opinion on others. You used underhanded
| tactics like false dichotomies. "I don't want my house to
| look like it came from 1920". Than, caught on a fallacy,
| you resorted to ad hominem, pretended to have a high
| moral ground and rode into the sunset in your high horse.
|
| It's all written down for anyone to see.
| OscarTheGrinch wrote:
| Many furniture stores have a section with old timey stuff,
| I guess targeted at the 60+ market: ruffles and pleats and
| doily type shit. You can't expect anyone younger than a
| mummy to be enthused about buying that stuff new, whether
| or not it is better quality, and it's probably all the same
| cheap crap under the ruffles.
| Spivak wrote:
| And in slightly younger but still old the iconic Laz-y-
| boy look is associated with boomer dads with more money
| than taste so I'd be shocked to see anyone not of
| retirement age excited to buy one new either.
| OscarTheGrinch wrote:
| Even Ikea has a "granny shit" sofa selection.
| klondike_klive wrote:
| Ugh this - my partner hates the sofa that I inherited from my
| mother, one that she told me she used to play on in the
| 1940s. It's a beast, with claw and ball feet that have
| stubbed many a toe, but I am fighting for its survival.
| MrDresden wrote:
| I got my great grandparents's German made sofa set from my
| mother some years ago (she was downsizing and didn't have
| room).
|
| Solid hardwood with carvings all over, legs shaped as claws
| etc.
|
| But frankly it looked horrible in a modern home, and wasn't
| all that comfortable to sit in.
|
| So I sold it to a carpenter who was renovating an old
| wooden building in the remote north (Iceland) to have an
| interior that would fit the year of construction (I believe
| around the year 1905).
|
| Kind of like the idea that it is now in a much better
| place.
| RajT88 wrote:
| I hate to tell you, I don't think you can buy a recliner that
| doesn't look like "old fart stuff". Recliners are kind of
| "old fart guy chairs".
| 8338550bff96 wrote:
| After looking at what had to be every nursing chair in the
| world we found that the most old-farty looking la-z-boy was
| better in every regard and easier to clean. Sometimes I
| just go in the nursery and doze off in it
| mlrtime wrote:
| 100% Same... Every nursing chair was way overpriced and
| small.
|
| We found a lazy-boy type glider/recliner... it doesn't
| look as modern but boy is it so comfortable with a
| newborn.
| baggachipz wrote:
| Disagree; you have to know where to look. Yeah, you go to
| the Lay-Z-Boy big box, you're gonna get that. We got a
| recliner from Ethan Allen that doesn't even look like a
| recliner. But you lean back, and voila... super comfy.
| q7xvh97o2pDhNrh wrote:
| The Eames lounge chair is a reasonable solution to this
| problem.
|
| (It probably invokes other stereotypes. I don't really
| know, but either way, you'll be too comfortable to care.)
| RajT88 wrote:
| It looks like you should be smoking a pipe while lounging
| in it.
|
| Feels 60's to me.
|
| ETA: Basically unchanged since 1956 is why!
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| Comes down to materials. A modern leather sofa without all
| the bulky frills can pass off as modern and still have
| reclining features.
|
| It's also expensive as all hell. I grabbed a "man-cave"
| style two seat recliner with middle seat that transforms
| into a cup holder: that set me back over $4000. Worth it.
| Simplicitas wrote:
| > they fail the "normal human being" test
|
| Hahah
| ToucanLoucan wrote:
| My cynical ass assumes it's because they know goddamn well no
| one under 60 years old has $4,000 to spend on a properly made
| sofa, irrespective of desire or taste. I make six figures and
| I certainly don't.
|
| My furniture is all cheap particle board shit because I can't
| afford anything nicer because I'm spending all my money on a
| mortgage, food, gas, and student loans. I don't think it's a
| matter so much of nobody wanting to make good quality
| products so much as all the companies that did do that and
| priced their products accordingly are running out of
| customers, because we're all getting strip-mined by the rest
| of life's expenses going up all the goddamn time. I would
| love nothing more than a gorgeous, well made sofa that will
| last me a solid chunk of my remaining life, but where the
| fuck am I getting the money for it?
|
| It's the boots theory of economics applied to everything.
| I'll spend $7,000 on sofas before I die and still have a sore
| ass.
| corford wrote:
| Gary Stevenson agrees with your assumption. If you haven't
| already, you should check out some of his work and recent
| book on this. TL;dr: your cynical take is correct.
| noduerme wrote:
| You say it yourself. Why spend $7k on couches over a
| lifetime when you can spend $4k on one that lasts forever?
| If you can only scrape together $1k a year for a new piece
| of garbage, maybe you should sit on milk crates til you can
| scrape together $4k.
|
| Maybe the fact that no one thinks this way anymore explains
| why everyone complains their six-figure income is
| constantly eaten up by replacing cheap shit.
| ToucanLoucan wrote:
| Hear me out: what if we reversed the various societal
| changes made since the Reagan era so people make enough
| money to afford the things they need and want like every
| generation before mine did, instead of just normalizing
| this notion that you need to eat shit for years on end so
| you can have the privilege of nice things?
|
| And that would have knock on effects for huge societal
| issues like climate change. Imagine how much cheap shit
| wouldn't need to be made if so many people weren't
| deliberately kept on the edge of poverty so as to foster
| consumption practices that make stock prices go up?
| noduerme wrote:
| I'd argue that reversing those changes would require a
| grass-roots effort to stop consuming so much cheap
| garbage. If people bought American and demanded high
| quality products, American manufacturing would benefit.
|
| But also - I think the 1950s-80s were a complete
| abberation in which working middle class people could
| afford a better lifestyle every year. Not "every
| generation before" ours could afford a house and two cars
| on a factory income with a pension. Really only one
| generation got that, and it was mostly due to winning a
| world war that left us the world's only major supplier of
| everything, able to project military power and gobble up
| all the cheap oil and raw materials. Previous generations
| had no such thing. My grandfather grew up without indoor
| plumbing. He also worked 12 hours a day. He couldn't
| afford a modest house until his late 30s, which was after
| the war. Go further back and look at the stock bubbles
| and robber barons of the 19th Century. The wealth and pay
| distribution we have now is closer to historical norms
| than anything in the 1960s was. The major difference is
| our baseline quality of life is higher in the sense that
| everyone can afford a cheap couch (if they want one). I
| have to think economically like my grandparents, not like
| my parents.
|
| People like my grandparents built this country by saving
| and sacrificing their comforts. People like my parents,
| boomers, got an incredibly easy ride. Now their kids
| expect it to be that easy. But cheap money can't go on
| forever, and it's cheap money and a two-car suburban
| family lifestyle that did all the environmental damage of
| the mid 20th Century that we're still trying to slow down
| or reverse.
|
| tl;dr saving and buying the better couch is a more
| effective means of changing the status quo than
| complaining that everything is harder for our generation.
| yterdy wrote:
| Contrary to those coming out of the woodwork to tell us
| how much we can't have dignity and decent things, let me
| just, "Hear, hear!" you.
|
| We have so much stuff we don't need, and we barely
| scratch the surface of utility of the stuff we have
| before throwing it out.
| codemac wrote:
| There's probably a financial argument here related to the
| same money invested, but we all know folks aren't
| investing in the difference - they're buying more and
| other junk.
| verall wrote:
| It doesn't help that in 2024 a $4k sofa is probably crap
| and you need to spend like $12k+ for something that lasts
| 100+years
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| >no one under 60 years old has $4,000 to spend on a
| properly made sofa, irrespective of desire or taste. I make
| six figures and I certainly don't.
|
| I do and did, but I live alone. I'm guessing you're
| supporting a family?
|
| of course, cost of living is also a huge factor. A $4000
| couch is pretty much $4000 everywhere. But someone in SF
| vs. the Southwest (both making 6 figures) have very
| different rent and general life expenses.
| tacocataco wrote:
| Is it about the style or look of the product? or is this a
| "weekly pill organizers are for old people" thing?
|
| People learn to be comfy over time. I dont need to live life
| like i dont know what I'm doing.
|
| Getting old rocks, but maybe that says more about the
| terrible quality of life during my younger years then it does
| about current year.
| stephenhuey wrote:
| Been putting off commenting for over 24 hours and this is still
| on the front page! I can confirm there are quality furniture
| makers here in the USA, though they can be hard to find.
|
| A decade ago, I shopped for the first time at the most famous
| furniture store in this part of Texas: Gallery Furniture.
| Growing up anywhere within an hour or two of Houston in the
| 80s, Mattress Mack was more recognizable to a kid like me than
| any news anchor or any other television personality. Before the
| 80s was over, I'd probably seen him hop in the air hundreds of
| times with a fistful of dollars, talking about how Gallery
| Furniture will save you money, and he's still going strong
| today. He even toured big city and small town schools warning
| kids about drugs. Anyway, I had gotten by for years on hand-me-
| downs and IKEA furniture, but it was time to replace something
| ratty, and I walked in there with a vague impression that it
| might be more pricey than other stores. They told me it was all
| made in America (some places up north like Indiana?) and when I
| was asking about cheaper sofas that a guy over 6 feet tall
| could comfortably nap on, they pointed me to one they said was
| made locally in the Houston area. It was very long and had a
| very simple design and had firm foam that wouldn't sag
| (something I had asked for), and they let me have it for $500,
| and it felt like much better quality than a lot of the prettier
| stuff in other furniture stores.
|
| A couple years later when I got married, we were looking for a
| nicer sofa, and I figured out that the local furniture maker
| that Gallery Furniture had been selling was called Living
| Designs Furniture and had a factory in the East End:
|
| https://www.livingdesignsfurniture.com
|
| Their factory's showroom was very bare, but it was full of
| pieces, including a colorful chair in the shape of a stiletto
| shoe! We found an elegantly shaped light gray sofa long enough
| for me to sleep on, and again with high quality foam, and they
| built one with some slight customizations we wanted for $1,081
| total. Unreal, because we have a white sofa from IKEA that
| isn't much less, but the quality is on another level!
|
| I'd really like to see a resurgence of products like this in
| the USA. I've heard of some custom sofas costing several
| thousand, but somehow this local company is managing to sell at
| a lower price point. 18 years ago, a buddy of mine was living
| in Charleston, South Carolina. He had talked to a local high
| end furniture maker about doing a 3-year apprenticeship to
| learn how to make fine furniture, but in the end he knew he'd
| make very little per year in wages (he estimated $35,000 or
| so). Instead he pursued another dream and went to Napa Valley
| for a one-year course at the only open-wheel racing mechanic
| school in the country and ended up working on an Indy Car team
| for a dozen years. Hopefully more guys like him can find the
| furniture maker route feasible in the future if American
| consumers can escape the throwaway mindset. The average
| household doesn't need expensive Amish Craftsman offerings. A
| lot of people could afford this local furniture maker we have
| available, but I understand it could be a risky business
| venture to try to compete with the stuff shipped over the
| ocean.
| bradley13 wrote:
| This. We paid $10k for two sofas. Leather-covered, solid
| quality. That was more than 20 years ago. They look a bit
| weathered now, from kids and pets, but they are holding up
| fine.
|
| Pay for quality. It saves you money in the long run.
| elwell wrote:
| > Pay for quality. It saves you money in the long run.
|
| Unlikely. Our sofa is like $300. Let's say it only lasts 3
| years before it shows wear or we get bored of it and get
| another $300 one... your $5k sofa would have to last for 50
| years to 'save money'. Not to mention the opportunity cost of
| those funds.
|
| Pay for quality if you want quality, not in an attempt to
| save money.
| ineedaj0b wrote:
| Do you have pets and kids?
|
| A $300 couch could last many moons in a house with no
| terrors.
| elwell wrote:
| I was being exceedingly conservative to strengthen my
| point.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| I was hoping this stream of consciousness was going somewhere
| standardUser wrote:
| I have 3 sofas and all of them were free. One is from a neighbor
| and the other two from the Buy Nothing group on Facebook. I have
| never been able to convince myself that any piece of furniture is
| worth the thousands of dollars that an average couch costs. The
| one exception being the bed (which is the actual most important
| piece of furniture anyone owns).
|
| What truly baffles me is how, in my middle-class suburban
| hometown, all of these families were able to furnish their
| massive 3-5 bedroom homes. Many families, including my own, would
| have a living room that was mostly for show (because hanging out
| happened in the den/TV room) yet contained thousands or tens of
| thousands of dollars of furniture.
| ghaff wrote:
| What you describe doesn't seem "enormous" at least as bedrooms
| are normally used in descriptions. I have a den/living room
| which is what we normally use with company as we don't really
| watch TV so there isn't one there. That has a sofa from my
| brother. A couple other good futons elsewhere (guest bedroom
| and a very small TV room) but just futons. And that's about it.
| swatcoder wrote:
| > middle-class
|
| That's your explanation.
|
| The modern professional "middle class" was once called the
| _petit bougeuosie_ and characterizes itself by trying to
| replicate aristocratic aesthetics and lifestyles with earned
| wages, which is mostly a lost cause and just creates a endless
| treadmill of labor and consumption.
|
| Good on you for being so thoroughly free of the compulsion that
| they're an alien bafflement to you!
| brikym wrote:
| The key aspect that allows the businesses to get away with this
| is the buying frequency. You might buy a couch once every 10
| years so it's very difficult to judge quality. Whereas with
| something like coffee beans I'm buying it every week so I have 52
| opportunities every year to analyze the quality and change brand.
| The couch seller knows you probably won't make a repeat purchase
| so it's all about marketing tricks.
| hwc wrote:
| I would rather have a hardwood bench with good thick cushions
| tied on. Then instead of reupholstering, you just replace the
| cushions.
| amelius wrote:
| Perhaps this Wirecutter article can help:
| https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/guides/buying-a-sofa/
| aridiculous wrote:
| Remembering the old adage: don't cheap out on anything that
| touches the floor (shoes, sofas, beds, cars, etc)
| ak217 wrote:
| If you're looking to reupholster, I've had great luck with
| https://www.slipcovershop.com/. They make custom slipcovers and
| sell affordable cloth by the yard that you can use to easily
| reupholster stuff yourself if the shape is not too complex.
|
| Other than that, I wish this article went less into things that
| don't matter (properly sized brackets are no worse, and sometimes
| better, than joinery, etc.) and more into the ergonomics, types
| of foam and other materials that actually matter. Like, how do I
| tell how long a cushion filling or fabric will last, or tell if
| there are springs that will sag without taking it apart.
| yuuuyuyyy wrote:
| Yup. A few years ago I bought a $1500 sofa from I think BluDot?
| It was trash. It rocked back and forth on a flat, level floor
| because the legs weren't all the same length. One of the legs was
| already cracked when it was delivered (independent from the
| different lengths problem). And the cushions were absurdly hard,
| but also too soft. I didn't take the cushions apart to see what
| was going in there but it felt like you were sitting on a wooden
| board with a way-too-soft spring underneath. They offered a
| 10-day return policy, and what do you know, when I requested a
| return on day 2 and then again on day 5 and then again days
| 6,7,8,9,10,11 ... they just didn't respond, until eventually like
| a month later I managed to get someone on the phone and they told
| me the 10day window had already elapsed so no backsies. When I
| left a bunch of 1star angry reviews calling them a fraud on every
| website I could think of, someone hired some mover-on-demand
| service and an old minivan showed up at my house to take it away.
| The mover didn't know where they were supposed to take it to. I
| gave them the store address where I bought it. What an absolute
| trash company.
|
| Years later I spent $3500 on a sofa from Design Within Reach and
| it's terrific.
| rayiner wrote:
| Sofas and rugs are inherently labor-intensive things to make
| well, where quality materials make a huge difference. I grew up
| with real wool-silk rugs my parents brought over from old
| country, or my dad bought on work trips to Afghanistan or
| Pakistan. I never gave them a second thought until I bought my
| own house and tried to furnish it. What I had thought were just
| regular rugs would cost $5,000+ in America.
| tptacek wrote:
| Rugs are famously an expensive luxury item.
| spike021 wrote:
| I've had a two-seat sofa from Living Spaces since.... 2017 and
| it's held up really well. Even the cushions have no wear despite
| my dog loving "digging" into them (basically scratching for a
| while digging an imaginary hole). I think this sofa was like $800
| plus tax/delivery but I sit on it every day and it's held up
| really well, especially through one move.
|
| I think there's probably just quality:price tiers and mine
| happens to be in the economical but decent quality range.
| robert-brown wrote:
| The best way to acquire a quality sofa is to purchase a used one
| made by a furniture maker known to create high quality pieces. It
| requires a bit of research. You need to figure out which builders
| around you produced excellent furniture 50 or more years ago. In
| the USA, Dunbar is an example. Buy an old Dunbar sofa from the
| 1950s and reupholster it. It will easily last another 100 years.
| VoodooJuJu wrote:
| Lots of people suggesting buying second-hand because the old
| stuff is made better - and it really is. The problem with
| thrifting is that everyone is doing it. The word is out. Price
| goes up and supply dwindles.
|
| Same situation with buying used cars. New cars suck. You can't
| work on them yourself and they have terrible UX. So people
| started only looking for used. Except the used prices skyrocketed
| to match supply & demand.
|
| We can't keep this up. We can't all keep thrifting. Everyone
| knows it's better, everyone is on the prowl, and everyone has
| easier access to buyers, thanks to the internet.
| smileysteve wrote:
| I mean, we can, as long as repairing is part of it, and
| rethrifting is too.
|
| The US largest generation is approaching life expectancy and we
| are below replacement numbers.
| sanderjd wrote:
| Ok, but I have no clue - either before or after reading this
| article - how to go about finding furniture that _isn 't_ junk.
| Truly, I can't figure it out. I've been to every furniture store
| in town and tried to figure it out via the internet, to no avail.
| For somebody who prefers to spend more money less often on
| actually good things that last a long time, but has neither the
| time nor inclination to be a hobbyist vintage store frequenter,
| what is one to do?
| deeel wrote:
| You honestly might just have to have one custom made. For ex.
| Ecobalanza makes very high quality and nontoxic furniture.
| sanderjd wrote:
| I don't really even _want_ new furniture though. I want a way
| to find high quality used furniture that isn 't super time
| consuming. The best options seem to be "go to all the vintage
| shops every week" and "check facebook marketplace /
| craigslist every day", and I just don't have that level of
| dedication.
| kube-system wrote:
| Furniture in the normal "furniture store" price ranges are
| built for price-sensitive markets with economies of scale. If
| you really want measurably higher quality furniture, you're
| probably going to want to look at brands with pricing an order
| of magnitude higher. This quality of furniture typically does
| not sell at high volume, so it is often only at specialty
| retailers, or is made-to-order.
|
| A good place to start in my opinion is with the well regarded
| office-furniture brands, Herman Miller, Steelcase, Hon, etc.
| They are well experienced in making furniture that can handle
| abuse, because commercial furniture takes a lot of abuse. And
| as far as durability goes, they make durable furniture in the
| highest volumes and have the most reasonable prices you're
| going to get.
| anon291 wrote:
| Go to an estate sale; pretty much everything you need for a
| house will be there. No need to frequent vintage stores.
| nealabq wrote:
| In the mid 80s I had a sofa and wing-back chair made by a little
| factory called Bader and Fox(?) in Portland OR. I went to the
| factory (the two owners were the only ones there) and picked out
| fabric/style/etc with some special instruction about the angle of
| the arms and stiffness of the stuffings. Cost about $1600.
|
| Best furniture ever. Carted across the country twice. I still use
| both pieces every day. They've been reupholstered once.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| To be fair, that must have been a lot at the time right?
| Adjusted for inflation its certainly a lot compared to
| furniture now.
|
| In 1986 a Mustang GT was under $11k, now its about 3x that
| price.
|
| 1985 median home sale was $80k, 2023 median home sale was about
| $450k.
| farhanhubble wrote:
| And why are the cushions so freaking soft? Sure you don't want
| your back to perch on lumber but you don't want to sag inside
| like an embryo, either.
| the_af wrote:
| This article seems to make it an American (US) thing, but I can
| assure you the sofas here in Argentina are mostly shit. If you
| look under the hood, they are every bit as crap or worse than
| described in TFA.
|
| It's not "cheap imports" either, I don't think sofas here are
| imported. They are made to order in my country. They are just
| garbage.
|
| I'm talking about midrange and even higher priced sofas. If you
| see the armature, it's mostly crap wood with "lots of staples" as
| mentioned. And a fancy cover, of course.
| donatj wrote:
| My wife and I spent a couple grand on a "leather" couch about 5
| years ago.
|
| A little over a year ago the "leather" started developing holes
| in it from wear all over the place. The so called leather is
| literally paper thin and bonded to some low quality fabric.
|
| I've never had this sort of problem with a couch before. It's
| very frustrating.
| gilfoy wrote:
| heh, nice leather shoes or boots cost in the hundreds, no way
| you're getting that much leather at any kind of decent quality
| for that price. maybe starting at 10x that.
| throwawaaarrgh wrote:
| Built my own sofa. Fabric from JOANN, foam from a shitty IKEA
| thing thrown on the street, some plywood and pine from Home
| Depot, hardware, staples. Cost me $75. It's comfy and I can lay
| on it or sit on it. What the fuck about this is supposed to cost
| >$1,000, I have no idea. Are they stuffing sofas with live minks
| or something? It's just wood, bolts, foam and fabric.
|
| For cushions I already had some, but you can easily make them
| with more JOANN fabric and a big box of poly stuffing. Extremely
| basic sewing skills and a pair of scissors are all you need.
|
| Give a man a fish...
| swayvil wrote:
| I dream of an inflatable couch. Bear with me. It could be well
| designed and high quality. And with a nice slipcover.
|
| There is somebody who makes them but for the life of me I can't
| recall who.
|
| They come with a built-in compressor.
| MarkusWandel wrote:
| We got a couple of secondhand ex-living room sofas very cheap.
| IKEA. Full leather, looked nice and an absolute dream to sit and
| lie on, just exactly the right combination of firm and soft.
|
| These were for the kid areas. They had reduced the previous (IKEA
| Ektorp) sofas to rubble over a couple of years. These new ones
| didn't last long at all. The suspension underneath the cushions
| is criss-crossed webbing in a softwood frame. Well you can
| imagine, a 90lb child jumping on that, the forces that develop.
| And then the frame breaks at the front. And there's nothing
| structural at the front of the sofa, just some 1/4" thick
| fiberboard, to anchor replacement frame material to so you can't
| really fix it.
|
| Oh well. One of them now has solid plywood - very well fastened
| to what structural elements are available - so it's now very firm
| but the kids don't care. The other, I had the inspiration of
| mounting the plywood lower and putting another layer of
| cushioning in there (leftover seat cushions from the demolished
| Ektorp sofas). That's actually pretty good.
|
| But without rambunctious kids, these sofas, which were already
| 10-15 years old, would have lasted quite a while longer. It's
| wizardly, the seating comfort they got out of such simple and
| cheap materials.
| dwighttk wrote:
| People want new sofas every few years bur can't afford good ones
| Tiktaalik wrote:
| > ...modern consumers "are buying a couch online that looks four
| times as good, costs two times the price, and is made twenty
| times more poorly."
|
| My friend had an Article couch and after a handful of months it
| was so uncomfortable it was as if the stuffing somehow just
| vanished.
|
| And yet when I look around the net all I can see are glowing
| reviews of Article couches all over :\
| nsxwolf wrote:
| After being burned by this many times, finally got a couple
| Chesterfield style sofas from Costco about 4 years ago and
| everything about them has been rock solid. And they were about
| $700 each.
|
| I later wanted something matching for a different room - but the
| problem is, the Costco furniture changes seemingly every day and
| you never see the same thing again.
| ownedthx wrote:
| Amish furniture is built extremely well. And the price is not
| cheap but not exhorbiant. And clearly American made :)
| RangerScience wrote:
| FYI, if you're in or near Los Angeles and have a budget, I can
| strongly recommend https://www.thejonesesla.com/
|
| Got a custom from them and (partly because I asked) it's crazy
| sturdy. Cost a lot, and I got what I paid for :D
| rufus_foreman wrote:
| A while back I moved half way across the country, the only two
| pieces of furniture I took with me were the standing desk and a
| leather sofa. Cost a lot to have them moved.
|
| Whatever else goes on in my life, I've got that sofa problem
| handled.
| linsomniac wrote:
| Around 5 years ago I tore down my sectional sofa to the sticks
| and completely rebuilt it. This was around 5 years old at the
| time, and was a cheap sectional (at most $600, possibly less, I
| don't recall), my wife convinced me to go cheap because "the kids
| will destroy anything we get".
|
| I will agree with the upholstery person in this article: it's not
| going to be worth it to pay someone to do it. I ended up
| reupholstering ours for around $500, but that's because I did all
| the labor myself. An amazing amount of work.
|
| It was made with a lot of OSB, some of the most curved pine I've
| ever seen, and lots and lots of staples.
|
| I fixed the frame by adding a variety of supports and glue and
| screws. The frame went from being barely sufficient to quite
| solid. I doubled the webbing and springs, and completely rebuilt
| the cushions. To an extent I used the existing fabric as the
| patterns for the new fabric, except: my wife wanted the cushions
| to have piping (that was a huge effort), and originally it had
| the back cushions built in and stuffed with polyfill, but I
| wanted to make them removable so I had to redesign the back and
| custom design the cushions.
|
| The biggest mistakes I made were the foam I used for the cushions
| was way too firm. If I were to redo it I would do something like
| a 3 layer: firm, medium, maybe latex or low density memory foam.
| I'd also probably have used a leather considering all the effort
| I put in, largely to keep the cats at bay.
|
| The real down side is that we're thinking of getting rid of it
| because it's really too big for our space, and unless I redo the
| cushions it's way too firm to use without additional pillows.
| But, despite all the work I put into it, I'd be willing to bet
| that we could't sell it, and probably couldn't give it away
| (selling furniture on craigslist is so frustrating).
|
| End result: https://photos.app.goo.gl/Q8DMxQU7L9AggCBDA Starting
| reassembly: https://photos.app.goo.gl/rQRJfmYmSLew3rSN8
| ryukoposting wrote:
| I just bought a sofa 6 months ago. It was my first time buying a
| big piece of furniture from a proper furniture store. It's
| (allegedly) American made. It is one of those pull-out queen bed
| convertible things, and that part is fantastic. The couch is
| nearly identical to the pull-out-bed couches I see in hotels. The
| only difference is the fabric. The bed mechanism is rock solid,
| but the couch itself is creaky and the cushions are already
| noticeably deformed. It's like they wrapped a great, tried-and-
| true bed mechanism inside a much shittier couch. It's clearly a
| step above Wayfair detritus, and I certainly didn't break the
| bank to get it, but I'm still a little disappointed.
| theendisney wrote:
| We need an app to design your own sofa. When done order the parts
| precut with a drawing and instruction videos.
|
| You also have to make a selfie so that you can see yourself
| construct it in the videos.
| baronswindle wrote:
| I have nothing to contribute but this video from comedian Rob
| Paravonian It's probably 20+ years old, but it frequently pops
| into my mind when I think about the apartments I lived in during
| my 20s. The materials were shoddy, but the price was right!
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8mV8BvVzYA
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| Christianity
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| I have decent and great furniture. Penny Mustard is outstanding
| and Room and Board is ok. My kids treat the Penny Mustard couches
| like a bed.
| j_heffe wrote:
| My Room and Board sofa from 2011 is still rock solid. I was a
| bit nervous buying it used a few years ago because of the age
| but it turned out to be a great purchase.
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| Yep, my only complaint was that an obese buddy of mine wore
| out a seam but R&B were good about it and sent someone out to
| fix it onsite. It's going on 10 yo and still looks new.
| topkai22 wrote:
| I bought a sub $700 leather coach from Costco in 2007. It lasted
| 6 moves and 16 years until my kids finally found its weak point
| (leather seams at the cushioning and back) playing "the floor is
| lava." Honestly, it's probably repairable even after that, but
| the wife wanted new furniture anyways.
|
| I haven't had to replace any of the relatively cheap stuff I've
| gotten from cost plus world market over a decade.
|
| I might just be lucky or special, but I don't think cheaper
| furniture is necessarily bad or throwaway. I'm not sure what the
| trick is. We've tended to buy robust looking furniture-- solid
| wood dining table, welded metal dining chairs, a plush and thick
| sofa. Frankly, our stuff looked very pedestrian compared to some
| of our friends, but it has lasted.
| anon-sre-srm wrote:
| Most people buy IKEA sawdust or are low information consumers,
| and the market responds accordingly. As such, people don't buy
| fine furniture or understand how to discern quality in a specific
| durable good.
| cheeseface wrote:
| The funny thing is that IKEA sawdust will most likely last
| longer than some more expensive "drop-shipping luxury brand"
| described in the article.
| teddyh wrote:
| Is online shopping turning most everything into a market for
| lemons?
| ejb999 wrote:
| IMO, yes - Its a lot harder to stay in business selling trashy
| products when you deal with people face to face in a given
| location, and hope to be there for years.
| peter_retief wrote:
| I imagine that they can go sofa but no further. Probably get some
| hate for this silly comment, someone had to say it.
| secretsatan wrote:
| The article goes on about the quality of manufacturing, which is
| very fair, but something that bugs me, and it seems to apply to
| cheap sofas as well as very expensive ones.
|
| Why are so many of them just plain uncomfortable? I'm looking for
| one I want right now, and I have to go around a furniture shop
| and try each out and I reckon, maybe 1/4 of them are suitable for
| a place you might enjoy sitting in.
|
| The high end furniture shops seem to be the worst, i've seen 4
| figure sofas that are the most uncomfortable thing I ever tried.
| Champions of form over function.
|
| My last favourite sofa was around 2500 I guess, lasted 10 years,
| was excellently comfortable, but was unfortunately the wrong
| shape for my new place, I have not found anything anywhere near
| as good as that one.
|
| It may be my height, much furniture seems a little off to me, and
| it is hard in general for me to find things I'm happy with.
| swatcoder wrote:
| > Champions of form over function.
|
| Sofas have many different functions.
|
| The plush sofa you sink deep into for TV at the end of the day
| has a different function than the firm sofa your dinner guests
| sit on the front of while sipping cocktails, etc
|
| Many of the sofas you were looking at were probably designed
| for a different function than you were seeking.
| pixxel wrote:
| Cocktail sofas. I'm not posh enough to have imagined such
| luxury.
| thfuran wrote:
| What exactly is the difference in function?
| colloydi wrote:
| I think this speaks to an important factor which is that most
| of us have little awareness of our posture and typical sofa
| designs reflect this. We want sofas to 'collapse' on rather
| than to sit comfortably. I became aware of this from learning
| the Alexander Technique to deal with another issue.
|
| One hack you can perform on most sofas is to add some height to
| the rear legs using castors or wooden blocks or something. This
| tilts it forward a bit. Sitting back or reclining is fine in a
| dentist's chair because there's head support but it's no good
| on a sofa! There our head and spines need to be balanced.
|
| Anyhow -- quality of materials and design are both important
| but the fact is that average bodily awareness is poor and this
| is a fundamental reason why our furniture is worse than it
| needs to be!
| vmladenov wrote:
| Check out the Stressless line by Ekornes.
| globular-toast wrote:
| The funny thing is someone told me this in an IRC channel about
| 20 years ago, a full decade before I'd even be in a position to
| buy my own sofa. Can't remember which channel it was, certainly
| wasn't a sofa-related channel, probably Linux related. I've never
| forgotten it for some reason.
| 01100011 wrote:
| Bought an Ikea particle board couch back in 2017 and it's still
| going strong despite heavy use by two fat people and 3 moves
| where it was dis/re-assembled. I recently added a support to the
| armrest where the unbacked fiberboard had caved in a bit.
|
| Sure, quality furniture is great but I'll wait until we settle
| down. For now, no regrets.
| thesaintlives wrote:
| They are bad because they don't cost 10-15k. Human bodies are
| difficult. They weigh quite a bit and often move about. Put
| multiples of them onto the object then stresses and strains will
| add up. Want that object to look cool, perform perfectly for
| multiples of years then you have a challenge!
| dt3ft wrote:
| All of the "steals" pictured look anything but comfortable.
| denton-scratch wrote:
| Not a sofa; but I'm sitting in an Ecornes Stressless recliner.
|
| It's the best piece of furniture I've ever bought. It's made from
| "engineered wood", covered in quite good leather; I should have
| chosen a lower grade of leather, because hide isn't as easy to
| look after as some of the lower-grade leathers.
|
| FTR, I've bought sofas and armchairs from artisan/craftsman
| makers, from junk shops, and I've also bought cheap disposable
| shit. After the Stressless, my best buys were all from junk
| shops. But this Stressless, I more-or-less live in it.
| classified wrote:
| Manufacturers discovered the same principles as the software
| industry. Most sofas are probably made by LLMs.
| m000 wrote:
| TL;DR: Capitalism breeds innovation. Just not the type of
| innovation the consumer would like.
| pif wrote:
| I have not read the article, but I bet the answer is a plain and
| simple: "Because people buy cheap instead of quality!"
| gmac wrote:
| In the UK I would thoroughly recommend these guys:
| http://www.ecosofa.co.uk/
|
| We picked them because they were one of very few UK suppliers who
| could supply a sofa that's not covered in toxic flame retardants
| (the UK has kept some very dubious legislation in place on this
| issue, I think mainly because the industry lobbies for it as a
| protectionist measure).
|
| The sofa we bought was on the expensive side, but not ridiculous.
| It's also seems beautifully made in general, and was carefully
| delivered by the firm themselves, who spent about half an hour
| manouevring it in.
| switch007 wrote:
| Don't get me started on flame retardants. It's definitely
| lobbying. So they can use cheaper materials which tend be more
| flammable then just drench it in toxic liquid and call it job
| done
| class3shock wrote:
| Has anyone found good options that are between stapled together
| cardboard with cheap foam that will fail in a couple years or
| $5000 and up designer brands? I love buying high quality goods
| that will last a lifetime but who has $5k for a couch/sofa?
| cchi_co wrote:
| A bit off topic, but my best investment has been in a good
| mattress for sleep. We spend half of our lives in bed, and it has
| been my best decision.
| krosaen wrote:
| Seems like the market rate for a well made sofa is more like 3-4k
| these days. If you think you're getting that for 1k you will be
| disappointed.
| anon291 wrote:
| The highest quality furniture can be found in antique stores or
| estate sales. Perhaps it's just me but my default has always been
| to buy old things with the idea that, if they've lasted this
| long, they'll probably last longer. I've always felt it was lower
| risk. But please don't all rush to buy old things; because I like
| the low prices too.
| boringg wrote:
| Don't worry I don't think this comment is going to the move the
| antique furniture market. Your secret is safe :)
| phatfish wrote:
| There are charity shops in the UK that get good furniture
| donated and they resell cheaply, the British Heart Foundation
| for example. You do have to check regularly to find something
| of a specific style/type though.
|
| Sometimes they don't know what they have, I picked up a Herman
| Miller office chair for PS30. It did have some paint specs on,
| which might have been why it was sold so cheaply. They came
| right off with a damp cloth though.
| danielvaughn wrote:
| I know I'm going to sound like an old person shouting about how
| "they don't make'm like they used to", but it's honestly true.
| This isn't just sofas - it's almost everything. Businesses know
| that it's far cheaper to make something _look_ high quality than
| to actually make it high quality. And if you can make it _seem_
| expensive, then you can charge expensive prices for it.
| hoosieree wrote:
| I'd like a sofa that:
|
| - is comfortable
|
| - isn't full of fire retardant chemicals which turn out to be
| cancerous right after the warranty expires
|
| - for less than $10k.
|
| Pretty sure that means I'm going to have to learn how to sew.
| meitham wrote:
| The cookies "partners" on the page is insane! Had to scroll
| through 100s of these then navigated away without reading the
| article!
| zac23or wrote:
| Everything is bad these days, not just the sofas. 1. The new
| switches I bought broke before the old ones, which are over 20
| years old. 2. LED bulbs last less than incandescent bulbs, even
| with a 20-year warranty. 3. The new cell phone's screen breaks
| very easily, it's not like the old Nokia's.
|
| And nowadays something expensive is no longer guaranteed to last.
|
| This is why I value old things so much:
|
| I have an old chair to work with, it's not a good chair, but it's
| better than anything new. I did a restoration instead of buying a
| new one because the new one might not last long.
|
| I have a 10 year old car, I'm scared to buy a new one with the
| bizarre stories about new 3 cylinder engines breaking (throwaway
| engines?)
|
| I try to use old things as much as possible. I stopped using an
| old Android when SSL stopped working. It's not a matter of lack
| of money, it's a lack of confidence in new things.
|
| The last brand that I gave some value to was Sansumg. My last
| cell phone... THEY FORGOT to add a piece to fix the flat cable
| for the on/off button. And twice the on/off button stopped
| working, and twice I sent it to technical assistance. The third
| time I opened the phone and repaired the button myself. My two
| Sansumg TVs break a few days after the warranty ends.
|
| My sofa broke in less than two years.
| katbyte wrote:
| I think there are still quality products out there, but they
| are rare and expensive and you have to spend forever
| researching to figure out which products are :/
|
| still are as so many see to be purchased and then running the
| ground for short term profits
| runeb wrote:
| There should be a market for a Wirecutter type site for buy-
| it-for-life products
| lowlevel wrote:
| I fully agree that new is very often worse than old. I've had
| to return 3 new iPhones in a row for manufacturing defects and
| out of box software errors. A TV lasts me maybe 4 years before
| it's 'broken' and needs to be replaced.' Home appliance
| longevity is laughable now.. (especially Samsung, my gosh.)
| I've purchased 5 new cars over the past 15 years or so, only
| one of which didn't have serious problems from new that had to
| be dealt with.. or could not be resolved/etc. We're just
| hitting bottom here, the next 10 years are going to be pretty
| rough.
| trogdor wrote:
| > I've had to return 3 new iPhones in a row for manufacturing
| defects and out of box software errors
|
| That is very surprising. Mind explaining what the issues
| were?
| ineedaj0b wrote:
| Other issues may be affecting the parent commenter if 3
| iPhones were unusable in a row.
|
| Perhaps not. But I worked retail and some people could find
| a problem with anything
| ieee2 wrote:
| My experience: Our last two washer lasted for 20 years each.
| We have only third one now and first one did not break :)
|
| I have bought many (6) smartphones and non has broken during
| my usage and also after I passed them to others.
|
| We have 4th TV at home and each one was fully working when we
| replaced it after ~ 10 years. Current one (Sony), our first
| LCD is from 2012 and works perfectly (with just new set top
| box).
|
| I have bought/got many laptops and any of them has broken. I
| have laptop from 1996 or 1998 which still works. There were
| software issues there, but they are fixable by update. (I
| have never bought Acer or Asus though)
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > Our last two washer lasted for 20 years each.
|
| We quit repairing washers when we bought a 20yo Whirlpool.
| Same story for dryer except it's a 1988 Maytag.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| I think when they try to hedonically adjust for inflation -
| they do a terrible job.
|
| The quality of everything is trash. And if you want something
| that has the type of quality you used to get 30 years ago -
| you're going to pay close to 4-10x as much.
|
| Everyone is selling trash for cheap. We live in a mall of
| garbage.
| thfuran wrote:
| They're also selling trash for expensive, as stated in the
| article.
| abraxas wrote:
| On the electronics front I'd beg to differ. Apple has raised
| the quality bar on electronics by a mile in the last couple of
| decades. The gadgetry I remember from the eighties and nineties
| was very cheaply made with plastics that warped or cracked (or
| both) and cheap switches made of molded plastic and a ballpen
| spring. Casette player gears were mostly made of that white
| plastic that always wore down with not much usage. I went
| through many "high end" walkmans that did not last more than a
| couple of years each.
|
| It's all too easy to see the past through rose tinted glasses.
| Also remember that the "built to last" stuff from the past is
| often an example of survivorship bias.
| zac23or wrote:
| Of course, there have been many bad things in the past.
| Floppy disks, cassettes and VHS were horrible technologies.
|
| Did you use tube radios? They broke all the time.
|
| The difference is that they weren't intentionally horrible,
| they were limitations of an era.
|
| But at some point, devices start to last a long time. My
| parents' first refrigerator ran without problems for over 10
| years. I've had far fewer problems with CDS and CD players
| than with cassette players.
|
| And we used to have a lot of low quality items, but now it's
| much harder to find good quality items. And brand means
| almost nothing. Even Apple has been selling notebooks with
| horrible keyboards for years. I'm just using an Apple
| Notebook now, I've been waiting for years for them to change
| the keyboard.... The Nitendo Switch Joystick has a drift
| problem and Nintendo ignores it...
|
| There is no reason for a new Samsung TV to break after a year
| of use. Or LEDs. Or power switches. It's not a technical
| limitation, it's a choice.
| rossjudson wrote:
| You made me laugh with "refrigerator ran without problems
| for over 10 years". My family cottage has a still-running
| refrigerator that's been there for close to 40 years. Third
| or fourth handle, though ;)
| MrDresden wrote:
| My family cottage has an electric stove/oven that was
| manufactured in the 1930's. Works flawlessly.
| yareally wrote:
| My grandparents still use a fridge from the 50s for
| beverages in their basement. It's amazing how long old
| refrigerators last
| bwat49 wrote:
| laptops in general (not just apple) are way better than they
| used to be
| MrDresden wrote:
| Bought a Framework laptop last year to make sure I never get
| into a situation of having to throw away a whole expensive
| laptop just because the manufacturer decided I shouldn't be
| able to replace or upgrade parts easily or cheaply myself.
|
| You know, like Apple does.
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _Everything is bad these days, not just the sofas._
|
| When these conversations happens, I always wonder why people
| _want_ some of these items to last forever.
|
| Are you going to stick with that 10 year old plasma TV? Great.
| I want new tech, and this stuff moves fast. Furniture is a bit
| different, but my parents had all kinds of good, long-lasting
| stuff that no one wants because it's out of style.
| navane wrote:
| Would you prefer a Sofa As A Service?
|
| Our cheap ikea couch keeps lasting, preventing us from buying
| a nice, new one. We can't throw it out of it's not broken.
|
| It is long known that companies who sell good quality
| products go out of business after a couple decades at most,
| they saturate their market and because no one needs to renew,
| the company dies.
|
| Ironically ikea HAS to sell quality (for price) because they
| are such a big brand. Their stuff is great quality for price,
| so people keep coming back for upgrades, when they can afford
| it.
| pictureofabear wrote:
| Life's about "experiences" not owning property!
| snoman wrote:
| There's a psychological safety in knowing that something
| is yours and it can't be taken away; that you're not
| beholden to someone else for it.
|
| I think the proliferation of subscriptions in modern life
| has contributed to quite a bit of anxiety.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > Life's about "experiences" not owning property!
|
| Life is about being happy.
| digging wrote:
| So one should not own a sofa? Sitting on a sofa is a
| near-daily experience I'd like to be able to keep having,
| which is why I buy quality.
| zac23or wrote:
| > I always wonder why people want some of these items to last
| forever.
|
| My friend had a NEW Ford that went to the workshop more than
| 10 times in the first year of use. It's about trust that I
| will turn on the device and it will work.
|
| > I want new tech
|
| Buy it. I met people who sold their old iPhone and bought a
| new model every year, nothing against that. My problem is if
| the IPhone in this first year broke two or more times like my
| Sansumg.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > My friend had a NEW Ford that went to the workshop more
| than 10 times in the first year of use.
|
| I daily drive a 96 Toyota. My son's dd is a 63 Dart. Just
| picked up a 92 Buick with 35k.
| ineedaj0b wrote:
| The old cars are nice but when they crash... I wouldn't
| let my kids drive them. They don't do so good.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > The old cars are nice but when they crash... I wouldn't
| let my kids drive them.
|
| I don't know about nice but the bench seats eliminate the
| back pain from buckets - especially modern ones. Lack of
| pain increases spatial awareness.
|
| As for accidents they avoid the inherent risks that come
| with unremovable, attention-eating LCD display and
| headlights that blind all other drivers.
| pictureofabear wrote:
| I've had my 65" LED Samsung smart TV for almost 10 years
| now... it cost about $800 back then. I thought about
| replacing it recently, but decided against it because it's
| working great and I don't feel like I'd be gaining much to
| buy a newer TV. Technology hasn't really advanced that much
| since 2014...
| snoman wrote:
| If picture quality matters to you (no judgement, at all, if
| it doesn't) then OLED is a non-trivial step up in image
| quality.
|
| I get it though: for 90% of the stuff I watch, I couldn't
| care less about the quality. Much if it is on a small
| screen or in 1080p.
|
| ... but movie night with my wife/kids? Those are the nights
| I am grateful that the picture quality in my living room is
| untouchable by a theater. Those are the moments I,
| personally, live for.
| Too wrote:
| Does it have 4K and HDR? Those are game changers,
| especially on such a big screen.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| Are they _really_ game changers though? Baraka (1992) in
| 1080p non-HDR looks stunning.
| maccard wrote:
| HDR truly is. It's as big a leap as the jump from 480 to
| 1080 IMO.
| accrual wrote:
| I remember being quite blown away by my first Blu-ray
| discs (Planet Earth series) on a PS3 connected to a 1080p
| plasma, well ahead of ubiquitous 4K and HDR. It was the
| first time source quality really made a difference to me,
| coming from DVDs and rips.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > Are you going to stick with that 10 year old plasma TV?
|
| Absolutely. It cost me the price of a power supply repair.
| The display is beautiful and the interface is crapware free.
|
| > I want new tech, and this stuff moves fast.
|
| True! Advertising tech is ever evolving.
| ryandrake wrote:
| My home theater TV is a Hitachi plasma from 2007. It works
| exactly as it worked the day I bought it. You know what
| broke? The bog standard MacMini that acted as my HTPC
| suddenly lost the ability to output 1080i after a software
| "upgrade" so now I'm stuck with 720p.[1] so even if one of
| your tech doesn't fail, something else in your tech circus
| can fail, ruining the experience anyway.
|
| 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39687566
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > so even if one of your tech doesn't fail, something
| else in your tech circus can fail, ruining the experience
| anyway.
|
| I keep a 15yo gateway laptop hooked up to mine. The
| battery failed but otherwise it performs better than new
| (ssd,ram).
| runeb wrote:
| The irony here especially with furniture is that if you're
| rich enough to buy real quality design pieces you'll sell
| them for more than you bought them for when you're ready to
| move on
| jiveturkey wrote:
| The LED bulbs are a particular travesty. At least they are
| better than how we polluted everything with CF bulbs.
|
| Only buy CRI 95+ (99 if you can find them). Not because of the
| color rendering quality (although that is a great benefit), but
| because they will tend to have appropriately derated other
| parts of the circuit, which are the elements that fail. They
| can do this for that product because at the more upmarket
| price, they can afford the additional 0.02 in COGS.
|
| As to Nokia phones, well yeah. I understand there is a real
| market for them now, since they found they are very effective
| black box flight recorders.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| The worst part of it for me is how I can't really trust
| anything. Cheap, expensive, brand, generic, it doesn't matter,
| I can't trust it. I feel like I can only trust stuff I've made
| myself. If only I had infinite time to learn how to make
| everything.
| arbitrage wrote:
| You're exaggerating about light-bulbs. There is no way LEDs
| last less than incandescents. If you are experiencing this, its
| possible your wiring is bad. You should call an electrician and
| have them check that out.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > There is no way LEDs last less than incandescents.
|
| Sure there is. I bought a case of Sylvania LEDs in 2019.
| They're used a few hours a week and I've tossed 5 of the 15
| I've installed.
| TillE wrote:
| I've been using a Philips 100W equivalent bulb for about 12
| hours a day for almost 9 years now.
|
| Companies can always manufacture garbage if they don't
| care, but LED technology is fantastic.
| ejb999 wrote:
| Same here - I am constantly replacing my LED lights whereas
| parts of my house still have 25 year old incandescents that
| have never been replaced since I moved in.
| ryandrake wrote:
| Same here. I keep a big box of LED lights hanging around
| in a box and am constantly replacing them. I had to
| replace incandescent lights too, but not nearly as often.
| Everything is designed to fail.
| Little_Kitty wrote:
| Phillips master ultra efficient, similar to their Dubai
| lamp, may be what you need. Running much less power per led
| is more efficient, so there's less heat and the lifetime is
| massively increased. Big Clive put a good video out about
| Dubai lamps a few years back.
| zippergz wrote:
| There are some very bad, cheap LEDs on the market. Sometimes
| even under name brands. I've learned to be pretty picky about
| which ones I buy, both in terms of their longevity as well as
| the quality of the light.
| chii wrote:
| LED dies often due to insufficient heat dissipation, which
| could be due to the cramped design of the actual light form
| factor.
| maccard wrote:
| Unfortunately my experience matches this - our LED bulbs are
| lasting between 2 and 5 years. There are truly just some
| cheap, shitty bulbs out there.
|
| But, they cost PS3 each and leaving them running 24/7 will
| cost you less than PS20/year.
| ericpauley wrote:
| Standard incandescent bulb life was around 1000h. Do you
| use these LED bulbs only an hour a day?
|
| I suspect most people simply forget how often highly-used
| incandescent bulbs had to be replaced.
| genmud wrote:
| You are absolutely incorrect. Most of the LED bulbs on the
| market have incredibly poorly designed power circuits that
| absolutely _cook_ the passive components.
| mmcnl wrote:
| My experience is completely the opposite.
|
| Nokia phones weren't as durable as you remember. A Nokia phone
| would hardy last 2 years with limited use, either the battery
| or power connector would die quickly. iPhones get way more
| usage than Nokias and they easily last 3 years.
|
| Also I've literally never had a LED bulb die on me.
| tomxor wrote:
| I don't know what kind of nokia your talking about but I use
| a 12 year old nokia feature phone, works fine, very robust,
| had countless drops, onto countless surfaces, often gets
| smushed when I go rock climbing and forget it's in my pocket.
| The battery is barely working but I still get 4 or 5 days
| charge on it.
|
| I will have to upgrade soon to a 4G version because the 3G
| bands are getting repurposed in the UK over the next few
| years. Otherwise I would have kept going with it. Thankfully
| HMD still make the ones that run the S3 OS... which is
| immediately obvious when they actually bother quoting standby
| time in the specs; the KaiOS ones are basically just a worse
| android phone with all the same power drain issues and not
| enough compute or utility to justify it.
| SergeAx wrote:
| I recently switched from my 5.5 yrs old Xiaomi Mi 8 to Google
| Pixel 8. The new phone is 20% more expensive (inflation
| adjusted!) and at almost all metrics a bit worse than the old
| one. The only thing better is a camera (and I suspect it is
| because of the software, not the hardware). There are other
| departments where Pixel is better (CPU, wireless charging,
| newer OS version, eSIM support), but I don't use it.
| ncr100 wrote:
| No, in my experience there's is "cheaper then ever" , these
| days and cheaper can be worse quality, naturally.
| akkad33 wrote:
| This reflects my experience so much it's surprising to read
| hcknwscommenter wrote:
| I'm generally very skeptical of brand/store loyalty type
| arguments, but lately I've found that in the US, Macy's furniture
| is still good value for good quality. I've had to completely
| furnish a few rooms over the last couple of years and looked at
| all the usual, e.g.: costco, ikea, wayfair, jordan's, etc., as
| well as expensive hand-made local shops, and I keep ending up at
| Macy's in the end.
| wobbly_bush wrote:
| Can you elaborate on why you chose Macy's over others?
| causi wrote:
| I wish I could find a sofa that was designed for repairability.
| The only thing that ever wears out is the cushioning under the
| seat but I've never been able to find someone who offers repair
| services.
| racl101 wrote:
| I have always found that the best sofas are the ones you least
| expect. Never a rich person's big fancy sofa but some
| girlfriend's, who lives in her tiny apartment, beat up, sofa, for
| example.
| Ensorceled wrote:
| When my mother was younger she used to reupholster furniture as a
| hobby.
|
| Older, antique furniture was much easier to work with and most
| newer furniture was practically impossible to reupholster at all.
|
| I was pretty easy to see the difference once the bones were
| exposed.
| ardaoweo wrote:
| Soon the cheapest Ikea sofa I could find in 2015 (about 200 $)
| has lasted me a decade. Sure, the cover worn is worn out and
| covered with another textile for that reason, but it's still
| usable. I can sit on it and watch my TV, which is even older.
|
| Easiest way to find happiness in material quality of life is to
| lower one's standards.
| ejb999 wrote:
| I agree, cheap taste in things is a blessing in disguise.
| mcguire wrote:
| Pro tip: Estate sales.
|
| Many very good, long-lasting pieces of furniture come on the
| estate market for very cheap because a) no one wants to move the
| giant solid-wood china cabinet, or b) you can get a $15 sofa or
| table mailed to you, why would you want an ugly flower pattern on
| something that has already outlasted one owner?
|
| Look for Thomasville, Drexel, or similar from the 1950s to the
| 1980s. Lots of midcentury modern, if you like that sort of thing,
| but plenty of other designs.
|
| I'm writing this on a desk (currently missing the leather insert
| in the top) made of solid pecan. We got a 10' china cabinet,
| dining table that seats 12, and chairs for $300 a while back.
|
| Unfortunately, I haven't seen stackable bookshelves from the
| 30s-60s lately and they were getting somewhat expensive, which
| puts a crimp on my obsession to decorate entirely with books.
| Decabytes wrote:
| I got a Lovesac Sactional after using a couch for years that was
| a handme down of a handmedown. I like it but it was not cheap
| (~4.5k). The modular nature fits our lifestyle so I'm willing to
| pay the premium. Having had to move a couch multiple times, I'm
| looking forward to just being able to break this one up into
| sections and take it out the door.
|
| They've got an ingenious model from a profit perspective as well.
| Since you can't charge subscriptions for stuff like that, they
| can sell you pieces of a Sactional and then you can get more
| pieces as the space you live in gets bigger or your life style
| changes. They also sell additional covers so if you get bored of
| the previous ones, you can change the color without getting a new
| couch (though it is not easy to get them on and off).
|
| My advice, wait until it's on sale. They regularly go for sale
| from 15-20%. If you aren't fussy about the type, Costco usually
| has them too.
| iKnowKungFoo wrote:
| I bought my Sactional in mid-December with a 25% discount. All
| of the reviews I found were very positive. This thing is a
| beast! I only wish I'd found a good rug before setting it up.
| It's on a tile floor but hasn't budged so far. I love its Lego-
| ness.
|
| The center section of my last sectional broke after about four
| months. Should any section break, I can quickly replace that
| piece instead of having to "deal with it" or replace the whole
| thing.
| sumtechguy wrote:
| I too bought into this system. My only grip is the cushions.
| They need to be regularly fluffed back out. Which does not give
| me good hope for the longevity of said cushions. The rest of it
| is fairly solid. The size I got would have taken a 3 man team
| to move/setup with a more traditional couch. I can do it myself
| in under an hour. Cleaning under them is pretty nice too as you
| can just pop out that one piece and clean under it quick.
|
| - (though it is not easy to get them on and off)
|
| no kidding. that was my second biggest gripe with this thing. I
| am in zero hury to use that feature.
| AdamTReineke wrote:
| We bought a pair of Sactional seats used for $1k. And I'm
| delighted that we did because we hate how uncomfortable it is
| for us. If you're thinking about dropping 10k+ on a Sactional
| set, keep your eyes open for used and even consider doing what
| we did and trialing a smaller section first.
| turtlebits wrote:
| People aren't willing to pay thousands for furniture anymore.
|
| My Rowe furniture sofa is 21 years old now and sits as if it was
| new. If I have a problem, I'll get it reupholstered or just order
| a new cushion from the manufacturer.
| mycodebreaks wrote:
| low quality stuff manufacturing should be banned or limited to a
| low quantity. It's bad for the climate and environment on
| multiple folds.
| chiph wrote:
| Ashley has a fair amount of their furniture made in North
| Carolina. It's obviously not at the same quality level as
| something like a Stickley, but if you want US-made furniture from
| a mainstream brand, they're a good choice.
| lnauta wrote:
| When my grandma passed away I took the sofa because I was a poor
| student in need of a sofa. After about 10 years of daily use I
| started to notice some of the cushions sagging. Asked the family
| when she bought the couch and it predates my birth by about 10
| years. Talk about quality.
| xn wrote:
| You can geek out on quality furniture at myfurnitureforum.com if
| you're so inclined.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| I have a cheap sofa today made of the sawdust and glue. I had
| "good" sofas before made of hardwood. They both feel fine under
| your butt and get wrecked by the cat before long. The new one
| comes apart in pieces so one person can easily move it in or out
| of a doorway or stairwell. Maybe the "joinery" is worse but who
| cares? It does the job and is easier to deal with, and that's
| probably why these things have replaced the old beasts. Plus if
| you are interested in things like the joinery under your
| upholstered furniture there are still people who will cater to
| that for a premium you'd justify somehow.
| blago wrote:
| When we moved to the US with two babies last year it was very
| important for us to buy non-toxic furniture. We ended up buying a
| sofa and chairs from Medley. Their products are made in LA out of
| wood and are free of formaldehyde, flame retardants, and PFAS.
| It's been only a year but it looks like the furniture is going to
| last.
| gytdev wrote:
| sofas are boring. Screw a few bolts to the wall and hang a
| hammock instead
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| Every sofa on that page looks like it belongs in the mansion of
| some Hollywood pervert.
|
| Just get a La-Z boy reclining sofa
| fuzzfactor wrote:
| Sometimes there's a lowest common denominator that puts pressure
| on everyone else to reduce quality & value, especially gradually
| over the long run.
|
| When it comes to sofas there's a less common low, and that's
| "model home" furniture.
|
| These upholstered representations look just like the real thing
| but they are not counterfeits, merely imitations of what it would
| look like if the model home were to be equipped with actual
| furniture where its usefulness was a consideration.
|
| Occasionally appearing on the second-hand market so caveat
| emptor.
| j7ake wrote:
| Because sofas that last are heavy and were meant for when people
| didn't move out of the same estate for generations.
|
| Now people move every few years. And it's hard to justify buying
| fancy furniture in a place you aren't staying for long time.
| eYrKEC2 wrote:
| Is there "open hardware" in this space? Someone was selling
| laser-cut frames and sofas that you assemble, which made me
| wonder if anyone has gone whole-hog and created reasonable open
| designs for laser-cut, diy sofas.
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