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
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.
Unless there is a drop of moisture, then you throw it all away.
It’s so depressingly wasteful.
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.
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.
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.
The down feather pillows didn’t do well—lots of feathers made their way out of the pillow.
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.
It's not cheap, but easily much higher quality than anything else in the same price point.
Where? I went around furniture stores and found it hard to discern any relationship between price and quality.
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.
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.
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.
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.
You can still get quality, you just have to pay for it.
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.
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.
Also it’s light, and makes moving much easier
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.
