Again in 2021, we purchased this couch secondhand on eBay. I knew that the key to getting an costly, trendy, high quality couch on a finances was to go secondhand, so I arrange alerts for a Conran couch and bagged this one for £150; the consumers have been promoting their property so wished a fast sale, and organised a pick-up through Shiply (this price an extra £90).
After which the couch sat in our front room for 3 years. We haven’t actually used it as our front room has been a makeshift warehouse for the previous couple of years with matches and workplace storage. It was in an okay situation, some marks and some tears within the cloth, however I knew I wished to do one thing with it that felt extra ‘us’. I’d been eyeing up striped sofas for years, I all the time liked Lucinda Chambers’s striped couch and Sophie from Cote de People is commonly styling dreamy multi striped cushions and sofas.
We needed to wait till we had sufficient cash saved, but additionally time to analysis if we wished to do it extra affordably. I used to be quoted roughly £1,000 for the stripping and fabric, however then cloth would nonetheless be on prime of that. I nonetheless assume that is first rate worth for a ‘bespoke’ couch that nobody else may have and the purpose of reupholstery is making one thing final – it’s nonetheless extra economical (and environmentally pleasant) than shopping for a brand new couch, nevertheless, we wanted to buy round.
I made a decision to look additional afield (primarily outdoors of London) and got here throughout Collins Upholstery primarily based in Haywards Heath. I remembered Jess Hurrell used them just a few years in the past and so they got here again with a quote of £550. The quote was with out cloth and there can be an additional assortment and supply price (I might add right here that this was a normal quote – we contacted them anonymously, not as an Influencer and didn’t negotiate value by way of providing protection). The beauty of contacting an upholsterer first is that they can provide you a tough estimate of how a lot cloth you’d want; we have been informed roughly 12-14 metres, which helped us finances the following step.
I began to analysis cloth. I am keen on manufacturers like Colors of Arley and Designers Guild however at £75 – £125 per metre I needed to preserve trying. I made a decision that the couch is a superb form, and the stripe might be an announcement in itself, so I wanted to belief that it could nonetheless look good if it didn’t price the earth. And realistically: I’ve by no means not appreciated something striped in my house or wardrobe! I went traditional and located St Agnes large stripe from Simply Materials – it was £19.51 per metre. I then purchased 14 metres to be actually positive we had sufficient.
Disclaimer: I didn’t test if it was appropriate for sofas and to be sincere the positioning simply says appropriate for curtains and cushions – I waited to see if the upholsterer talked about something however all I heard was how good it regarded when it was completed! We didn’t get it restuffed or something, I feel from simply placing all of it again collectively it appears to be like plumper, however they did repair one of many wood ft which had come free.
And all I can say is how a lot I LOVE IT! It makes the room really feel pulled collectively and brighter (I discover velvets suck gentle out of any space!). I do know it’s not tremendous sensible with youngsters however I strive to not get myself too labored up about it. The very fact I have a look at it daily and find it irresistible outweighs my fear for it to get soiled – I’d fairly use and stain one thing I really love, tbh.