I’ve never bought a sofa before, but I’m now sofa-less and need one.

Realistically (with no kids or pets, planned or otherwise), will a £1500 jobbie from Loaf (for eg) be 50% better than a £1k sofa from Next, or double that of one from DFS?

Frustratingly they all have super-long lead times, and I’ve just got rid of my old sofa 🤦🏻‍♂️

Our Next sofa is due for replacement now, 16 years isn’t bad. Had ordered from Laura Ashley But that didn’t go well.

Have a look at the Tetrad factory shop on Facebook, turn up with a van and take it away I believe.

Our DFS one ….the cheapest one they did….. (Not by choice , we sat on them all before finding out the price)

It’s lasted 8years to date.

We were 1200 quid for a 3 seat and 2 seat leather sofa.

Delivery was a pain in the arse though 8 weeks and * it’ll be delivered on X day….non negotiable*

Got one from IKEA and its all we need.

Yes, but you need to dig.

For example – the flame retardent chemicals that are used on lots of sofas in the UK are poisonous and absorbed through the skin – so sitting on them is what’s bad for you.

Thankfully outlawed in some EU countries, like Germany, where they just have a better quality (and more expensive) which makes them less susceptible to flame.

Thank god all our standards are going down the pan.

Anyway, research – you’ll be sat on the thing for thousands of hours over the next decade. If it takes you 40 hours of work to find, test and choose a great one that’s time (and money) well spent.

See if you can find a factory returns warehouse nearby. We got a brand new £1200 Made sofa for £400, it’s now looking a bit worse for wear after 7 years including young kids.

https://www.springvaleleather.co.uk

Not cheap.
Worth every penny.

We still have a couple of handmade leather sofas in the family that are coming up to 50 years old.

Bought a midrange Ikea one (Karlstad?) over a decade ago, it’s still doing great.

Got something a bit posher when we moved, found it less comfy so we ended up swapping the Ikea one back into the lounge and the posh one is by the kids play area.

My partner does reupholstering. Says the cheaper ones show when the covers are off and are harder to recover. They hoard good quality old furniture to recover and sell, as it’s better than most of the new stuff you can buy.

Avoid Sofa Workshop, bloody nightmare with missed deliveries then wrong things being sent, eventually got a refund and they collected the bits. Even screwed up on collection twice.

On the other hand sofa.com were great, staff in Bath store really helpful. Reasonably priced and pulled off a pretty quick delivery as we were sofaless for a couple of weeks.

IKEA one in the small sitting room has been pretty good too.

Rusty Spanner
Subscriber

https://www.springvaleleather.co.uk

Not cheap.
Worth every penny.

We still have a couple of handmade leather sofas in the family that are coming up to 50 years old

+1

I live near them, great people and great sofa’s.

Got one from loaf and one from ikea. Loaf one was considerably more expensive and considerably more comfortable and better made.

Mine came from the charity shop. Nice, comfy and cheap – and reduce reuse recycle!

Ours was £1600 from Sofa Workshop 24 years ago, but it is getting a bit knackered now and needs replacing. Happy we got our money’s worth though. Not sure where to go to get the same quality again, or whether we can afford it. Also slightly worrying that if the next one lasts as long I’ll be over 80 when it gets replaced. Assuming I last as long too…

Our last one was from Next and it was almost indestructible (it lasted 17 years and two newborns before we redecorated and it really didn’t match. Our current one is from Sofology and cost a fortune (£3k for a large sofa) but it is amazingly made and looks like new after two years.

My £500 DFS one is still going strong after 10 years and folk still comment on how comfy it is.
But guess what… don’t fall for their tricks – the sale never ends!!!!

But guess what… don’t fall for their tricks – the sale never ends!!!!

Does any one actually fall for that.

When I go sofa shopping I’m not speculatively cruising the shop looking for a cushion to be tempted by a cheap sofa…… If I’ve crossed the threshold it’s because the sofa I have has either broken or doesn’t exist.

Who just goes “for a look” speculatively

+1 for handmade, we had our 2 and 3 seaters from Daniel Keenan in Cheltenham, not that much more than regular priced high street brands (comparing what we found comfortable).

Have a couple of Thomas Lloyd Chesterfields too, there very comfy. Bought 1 new and 2 second hand.

Nabru.co.uk for us

Initially bought from them as our old house was tiny and customizable sizes meant we could get maximum seating out of a small area

Moved to another house & got a matching style one off eBay

Then recovered, from their shop,
The first was bought 12 years ago & we’ve just recovered them again, replaced a few of the cushion inserts too, feels brand new

There just made with MDF but modular nature means they will last for ever if you need to replace bits

Our DFS sofa was £1500 in the sale (was originally 2k)

Now its 5 years old and is used as a 2nd sofa

Would never buy from DFS again

Within a month one of the motors (its a recliner) started clicking when the the button was pressed and the seat was fully upright, called them out and after cancelling on us twice the repairer said no that’s normal all recliners do it, i said the other side doesn’t do it and our old recliner didn’t either

He refused to replace the motor so i spoke to the head office who agreed this was not normal and said they will replace the motor, so they repairer came back out and sheepishly replaced it

All was fine for another 2 years before i noticed the arm had begun sagging and the fabric on one of the bases had become loose, so i called them out again, they cancelled the appointment on us again! 2nd appointment the same guy comes out and says, the loose fabric is a quick fix (he unstaples the fabric pulls it tight and re staples) he says the arm is wear and tear and cannot be fixed

We explained the sofa is only 3 years old and has been used as a 2nd sofa for the last year or so, he doesn’t care and says sorry cant be fixed or replaced

So back on to the head office again, after a few emails and pics they agree that it shouldn’t be this bad within this amount of time but wont fix or replace the arm as the model is now discontinued

In the end they agreed to cancel the last 6 months remaining payments

In short stay away from DFS!

Our other sofa is a leather recliner from John Lewis, its 2 years old and has been faultless, its the main sofa so gets used a lot and still looks nice un like its counterpart across the room!

I’m not sure it’s a linear relationship.

There are some huge margins, so you may get lucky and get a great product for a great price. Or you may not.

Bought a sofa and chair from MFI (remember them?) 17 years ago and still using it now. Was bought purely because of its dimensions – sofa had to fit a specific gap.

Price was not part of the equation, but it just so happened to be the cheapest leather sofa they did.

It was a cut above in quality, and I can’t really square the price with the build and materials. Possibly contributed to MFI’s demise?

Anyway, there is some shite around now I’m looking to replace (finally). And I keep putting off the decision because I struggle to narrow down what I want. Price doesn’t seem to help indicate quality. Loaf, Made and a few other brands (Natuzzi?) seem to be taking the Michael.

Freecycled ours. Cleaned/dried it myself with help from internet fora. It’s top notch. Had new cushion covers made by a local maker after we’d had it 12 years or so. It’s still going strong now so a win for saving some nice furniture from the skip, and a win for not buying some ‘soon-to-landfill’ nonsense.

Couldn’t/wouldn’t have paid the 3k it would have cost new. Far more important/pressing things to spend money on. ymmv

My dad started his working life in furniture sales – he always used to pick up the corner of a sofa and could tell if it was any good by its weight. Heavy = good solid frame, lightweight = MDF crap.

We just bought 5kg of “feathers” from eBay and stuffed them into our saggy base cushions. Has plumped them up nicely.

Our two came from Sofa Workshop Direct about 20 years ago, £399 for the 3 seater and £299 for the 2 seater IIRC. They would be in excellent condition if it wasn’t for the four cats who use them as scratching posts / vomit target practice / a good place to dissembowel last nights catch etc. Still really comfy and the removable covers have come in very handy….

Judging by the colour of the faces of the men that lifted ours in …..it’s made of depleted uranium

We’ve got 2 of these from Oak furniture land (granted won’t be to everyone’s taste). Recliners, really hard wearing and some ridiculous guarantee for about £700 each. Excuse the cat house and slightly dying plant 😂

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2jiqvuA]2020-07-05_07-19-16[/url] by davetheblade, on Flickr

And paid £350 for this Chesterfield for the office on eBay. When I was looking there are loads of decent retro and contemporary sofas for decent money

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2jiqvKa]2020-07-05_07-19-32[/url] by davetheblade, on Flickr

Thanks everyone – as expected, almost no consensus in that case 😅

We had ours made by a small company about 12 years ago.

It’s still fine, but we will be replacing from John Lewis in a couple of months (probably with 13 week lead time) as Mrs Dubs now finds it uncomfortable with her bad knees.

We’ll probably freecycle the sofa & chair when the new ones appear.

We replaced our sofas 6 yrs ago when moving. Picked up a pair of M&S leather 3 seaters for £400 on eBay. RRP was £3500 for the pair. One was mint, the other had some wear on one particular seating cushion, but that’s never been an issue as we’ve used throws.

Still as comfortable and durable today as the day we got them – that’s with kids and animals doing their thang.

We’re been lining up our next set from Sofology because friends have them in their holiday home and they’re bloody lovely.

Made.com provided lots of furniture in my office. Lovely to look at and very contemporary. However, their customer service is non-existent so I’d stay well clear.

You’ll be sat on it for a long time. So spending less on a mail-order sofa you have not sat on before will be a false economy. I like Tetrad, personally, but they are not all comfortable, so you need to sit on one, really to test for shape., height and depth. Avoid feather seatpads. They only look good in photos. Daily plumping is a pain. You’ll find some good prices for used sofas on Ebay, people move and their old furniture may not fit. Look for Tetrad, Duresta, Heals etc. They won’t be “cheap”, but they will be good quality at reasonable prices. Factor in collection. They are big and heavy.

Also sofas come up larger than you think they will in your own house. Measure twice, buy once!

Mine came from the charity shop. Nice, comfy and cheap – and reduce reuse recycle!

What upholstery shampoo for spunk?

Spent a bloody fortune on Reids leather sofas once, they were dreadfully badly built, sagged like wayne rooneys mistress after only a couple of years use, won’t be spending such money again.

Our current ones are cheap triple and 2 singles from wayfair, IIRC they were about 600 quid all in.

Just ordered 2 new sofas from DFS, last pair of sofas were from DFS 10 years ago and are now looking tired, but 10 years if fine with me. We have just moved into a new house, so bought the old ones along and held off ordering until we were in. I didn’t have to be so careful moving them then.

We went to all the large sofa places, and just sat on every one that looks the right style for us, you just know when it’s right.

A bonus was the one we liked was on the cheaper end of things.

This is the thing – the DFS one I sat on was both comfortable and looked good – even my sister liked it (and she’s picky as hell). It was also the cheapest, but did have the longest lead time…

hmm

From what I saw, DFS did seem to hit the sweetspot of price/current style and comfort really well. We looked in Sofology, Harveys, Next etc

Next have a reputation for poor delivery. We certainly found that, promised Christmas delivery, ordered early November, a week before delivery was due they told us it would be New Year. WE kicked off, they did provide loan sofas (brand new, which they trashed on collection by sliding them into a filthy lorry with no protective covering). Had the loan sofas for about 2 weeks and then told the ones we’d ordered were coming. One is ok now the other creaks a bit when you sit on it, 18 months old.

Right, a couple of people have recommended sofa’s from Next and Marks and Sparks based my experience. Fairly recently, (3 years ago ish) we got a Next one to replace a 20 year old M&S one that was a stores demo one when we got it cheap. The Next one was refunded before 2 years because the leather on the cushions had some kind of coating which degraded and came away.

So we went back to the known quantity M&S. This had a collapsed arm in less than one year, and the other arm feels like it’s going the same way a few months later. The arm card went – and arm ‘card’ is exactly what it is – cardboard, covered in padding.

Absolute shit both of them, and I’d have well recommended M&S previously. The gang above aren’t wrong about their old sofa’s, but things have changed in the last couple of decades!

I picked up one from the local facebook community thing

2 seat leather needed to go before the new one came in 2 days

10 minutes round trip and lovely in the man cave

Looks like its never been used

and FREE

Picked up a lovley little chair also on marketplace for £20 – the lady used it to display cushions??? never been used

My previous sofa was a 2-seater from DFS (£600 I think), lasted 20 years and only needed replacing as I wanted something bigger.

Current sofa is a 3-seater from Furniture Village (leather with chaise end, cost £2k). It’s a couple of years old now, the leather is still in good condition (I can’t say I give it a regular clean/condition either) but I was a bit disappointed in how quickly the springs started collapsing in it. It’s still comfy to sit on but there’s noticeable dips in the regular sitting spots. Maybe that’s more a sign I should spend less time on the sofa and more time exercising though :p