When Bolton-based furniture maker received an order for a 40ft-long Chesterfield sofa, staff did not take the challenge lying down.
A team of six at Saxon Leather Upholstery worked flat out for four days at the company’s factory in Manchester Road to complete the 25-seater.
Weighing around 385lbs (175kg), It required 1,000sq ft of chocolate brown leather to cover its beech frame, and had to be shipped to its final destination, a hotel in Holland, in three parts.
Saxon sales boss Matthew Deighton said: “A normal sofa weighs around 20kg, so this was a monster of a piece.
“It was certainly the biggest item of furniture we have supplied in the company’s 27-year history, but we were up for the challenge. The frame was built locally and we provided the foam, upholstery and suspension.”
Saxon, which has 60 staff and turns over £5m, was established by Robert Jolly in 1982. Exports are surging amid the pound’s weakness against other currencies.
We hear stories all the time from our consultants about what can be found down the back and sides of our customers furniture, everything from money to false teeth!
Here are just a few:
Having sold a customer a set of Decra covers for her Parker Knoll recliner and matching chair and sofa, I began measuring the Recliner. On completing most of the measurements, I started checking out the tucks. No gap between the arm and the seat, but £1.90 in change (passed back to the surprised customer). Turning the chair around to take a photo I noticed a lump in the fabric flap, I pushed it in thinking it was where the scatter had been sitting against it, only to find it pushed back out and was very solid. Time for another dig and poke, watch off and down the back of the seat we go to find a pink hot water bottle (cold of course). “Ho!” the lady said, “I thought the grand kids had taken that.”
About 15 years ago, and in an upstairs flat of all places, I found a tortoise in the customer’s sofa bed!!! Needless to say the customer was thrilled to bits as she had noticed that the tortoise had not gone to sleep in the box in the airing cupboard for its winter hibernation and that it had escaped but had no idea it had taken refuge in the sofabed.
Last summer I visited a top floor flat in a nice new block at the request of a local estate agent on behalf of the landlord. I met with a young man who was the current tennant. Across the whole width of the lounge was a very expensive looking glass tank for some kind of lizard I presumed. I wasn’t too phased by this as lots of people keep them as pets and I don’t really mind them. Oh no it’s not for a lizard said the nice young man it’s for my amethystine python. My brains, vocal chords and legs all stopped working simultaneously as I then realised the tank was empty. The tennant obviously noticed I had gone a whiter shade of pale and said “oh she’s out at the moment, do you want me to put her back in”. Paralysed with fear all I could was nod my head frantically. Little did I know an 11ft snake was basking behind the settee by the radiator – apparently her favourite place. He quickly put her back in the vivarium as if it were nothing.
Come and see us and our Loose Covers & Reupholstery products at the BBC Summer Good Food Show and BBC Gardeners’ World Live – the Summer Hotspot for 2009 at The NEC, Birmingham.
We will be on the Stand SV128 – Hall 6 – in the Gardeners’ World Live section.
From Wednesday 10th to Sunday 14th June, The NEC in Birmingham will play host to two of the most eagerly awaited Shows of the summer celebrating two of our favourite pastimes for the long summer days – gardening and cooking for friends!
BBC Gardeners’ World Live will return with a fantastic line up of your favourite celebrity gardeners and experts to help you tackle your thorny gardening problems and provide ideas and inspiration for creating the perfect summer backdrop in your own back garden. New at the 2009 Show will be the live garden and allotment where the experts will show you what to do, and they’ll show you how to do it too!
1. Your furniture is looking tired and worn
2. Your furniture looks as though it never left the 1960’s
3. You have more padding than your furniture
4. Your furniture is cheaper to have re-upholstered than replaced
5. You want to be more creative with your furniture and decor
In January this year Plumbs launched their brand new Portfolio range of covers. These covers are made from breakthrough fabrics that fit superbly to your furniture and combine the feel of cotton with wonderful easy care properties. Choose from the latest colour choices including mulberry, stone, duck egg and oatmeal.
There have also been many other additions in fabrics in the last 12 months including cut velvets and soft chenilles. Velvet covers are now one of their best selling fabrics and available in 25 colours.
Throughout homes this spring, on all types of furnishings from fabrics and wallpaper to homewares, leaf motifs and tree designs and patterns are blooming. It seems like the biggest trend this season is ‘going back to nature’.
“Its appeal is perhaps symbolic of our desire for a simpler life and a need for a stronger connection with the natural world,” suggests Sarah Quilliam, head of product design for Hillarys, a window blinds specialist.
“When times get tough there’s a tendency to return to a more organic, holistic and nature-inspired feel in the home.”
Annie Deakin, editor of online home shopping emporium mydeco.com, agrees: “This year marks the bicentenary of Charles Darwin’s birth and the focus on nature has helped heighten the focus on textiles and home products which echo that theme,” she said.
Deakin says it’s time to turn on to funky botanical wallpaper and fabrics for a bang-up-to-date take on bringing the ‘outdoors in’.
There are many ways in which to reproduce this look in your home by using a feature wall of woodland print wallpaper and scatter cushions.
“Woodland patterns are huge this season,” says House Beautiful style editor Charlotte Boyd.
“Even if you don’t have a large garden, it’s possible to create a sense of the natural world in your home by using one of the new designs.”
She suggests adding a touch of woodland spirit with one of the new metallic tree motif papers.
A warm welcome awaits you at Plumbs brand new showroom on the Isle of Wight.
For residents and visitors this is a great opportunity to see the full Plumbs range of fabrics and options.
Whether it’s reupholstery, loose covers or the latest looks for curtains, you’ll find it all in Plumbs Newport showroom.
Please come and see us soon.
26 Holyrood Street
Newport
Isle of Wight
PO30 5AZ
United Kingdom
When you walk into a room or interior space, you’ll feel more comfortable if your eye can rest on a main feature. That main feature is called the “focal point” of the room.
If your room has a beautiful picture window looking out to a lovely garden, that’s it. If you have a fireplace, large or small, that will be the focal point in that room.
Sometimes a room has no distinguishing feature built in and you have to create one. Some ideas of focal points that you can add to a room are; large cabinet, oriental or patterned rug, dramatic mirror, fabric panel.
With the housing market crawling to a halt and Spring just around the corner, people are looking for cheap ways update their tired decor and give it a brand new twist.
Every year many sofas get thrown into landfills or left on the streets to rot, this is because no-one really knows what can be done; this is where Save Our Sofas come in.
Save Our Sofas gives you advice and ideas of ways to keep your old sofa, giving it a new lease of life, or provide environmentally friendly ways for disposal if it is beyond repair.
Plumbs, along with Save Our Sofas believe every sofa deserves a long life in a good home.
Find out about what's new in the Home Furnishings & Interior Design industry. Read about our staff, customers and the Plumbs family with general chit-chat about new fashions.
*£250 free soft furnishing accessories offer applies to all re-upholstery and traditional
finest furniture cover full price orders of 2 items or more. Acessories are: arm covers, fabric, scatter cushions, ottomans,
footstools. Offer applies to all fabrics (excluding dobby, hopsack, slub, cardinal and clearance) and cannot be used in conjunction with
any other offer or with Decra Furniture Covers & Designer Furniture Covers.
When Bolton-based furniture maker received an order for a 40ft-long Chesterfield sofa, staff did not take the challenge lying down.
