What we Do - Recovery

I am often asked if I think a settee is worth recovering/reupholstering, there is no hard and fast rule. Normally it depends on the frame that the settee is built on and also how old the furniture is. I have found in my personal experience that a lot of modern furniture is not made with the high quality frames that I use and regularly strip down people's furniture that they have paid good money for only to find chipboard and cardboard used as structural supports. That isn't to say that there isn't a lot of good solid used furniture out there and if you have had a settee for ten years, there is no reason not to have it recovered and bring it up to date with modern coverings and I'm sure it will give just as long again in service.

I am happy to come and give a no obligation quote to reupholster and I will do my best to give you an honest expert opinion of what would be best for your furniture. I do have to say sometimes even I get caught out when a "big name" does cut corners so please realise I can only give my opinion not a guarantee.

It doesn't need to be a settee or full three piece suite, a lot of my workload is made up of recovering smaller objects, I have done many fireside chairs and dining room seat pads, both as sets of four and also as larger sets like the church pews.

Below are some pictures from a recover job that I have recently been commissioned to undertake. From the outside the furniture looked like any other furniture but it is a good example of the surprise that can be lurking inside a piece of furniture. I will start by saying that this frame has lasted its owners a long period without any problems and i don't doubt it will continue to provide many years of service when i have recovered it in a new fabric to modernise it. But if you compare it with the picture of the frame i use on my new furniture you can see the difference.

Here you can see one of the "facings" of the sofa.
There is nothing wrong specifically with this but
it is a ply, on my frames all the structure is made
of solid hardwood, it might seem beyond what
is needed but my frames are made with traditional
methods and traditional materials

This picture shows the underneath of the sofa, here you can see that the main support is by fabric webbing, this strong material is slightly elastic to provide some deformation for comfort but again a more traditional method is to use a proper metal seat spring. It would be difficult to retrofit springs to this frame as i wouldn't be confident that the frame would handle the forces and the customer is happy with the furniture's comfort and so there is no obvious reason to change

This picture shows the front lower left corner of the furniture. Again this sofa has provided many years service and will continue to do so, however you can see that the corner is a little messy and the wooden joints don't look purposeful and to me. There isn't the same confidence as i would have with a traditional dowelled and solid wood construction. I don't think this will fail as it is not a load bearing area but i think it represents some of the typical finds under furniture's coverings

This picture shows the front edge of the furniture. Here the stand out point for me is that the main front edge isn't completely supported but instead is supported at points along its length. This means there are unsupported areas. These points are areas where creeks can occur and introduce flex into the frame. This will probably not lead to the failure of the furniture but this type of construction prohibits the use of tensioned metal springs due to the lack of strength compared to a traditional frame

This picture shows the rear of the arm, here you can see the lack of support to the joint above the arm. There is also a rough finish to the rear of the arm. This always concerns me, my frames are made by skilled carpenters and they have templates and so i know every frame is the same, there is no "tidying" or "filling" needed as they ensure their work in perfect and i put my trust in them. When small pieces like this are added on, the worry is if they come loose or do they mean the frame wasn't perfect in the first instance.