Thread: How's your Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, and Restoration Hardware furniture made?

Originally Posted by coffeeguy82

Well if those stores are not that great in quality...that rules out 99% of the furniture stores around my area in phoenix. Kind of weary buying furniture online without seeing it and wayfair has like 1000 brands that can be filtered out. Can you name off a few top quality ones? thanks!

We have Ladlow's Fine Furniture on Scottsdale Rd south of the 101 that carries Hancock Moore, Bradington Young and other quality furniture.

Originally Posted by drcollie

While they were checking out my Hancock and Moore # 9840 City Sofa I had on display (which costs a few hundred more) I pulled up the construction standards for the Bloomie's unit off the web:

https://www.chateaudax.com/modern-li...ofas-universal

How did you find construction specs on pieces of furniture? I constantly run into this conversation with customers and would love to be able to pull up a specs sheet and compare it to the specs of our Lexington, Hancock, American Leather...etc.

Sometimes I will go to a manufacturer's website and see how they are made, just out of curiosity. There is no central database of standards as that would be a Consumers Reports type of thing that would take a considerable effort and resources to accomplish. To do it correctly would require a tear-down of the chassis to see how they are made and no one is going to pay for that!

Did the chinese tariff thing finally force restoration hardware admit that a large amount of their furniture is Chinese made? I keep having people tell me it's a great place to buy furniture and I have to try to be polite and not tell people that they spent thousands on top of a $100 membership fee for junk.

One thing I have been wondering was say a person wanted to spend $1000-1500 on a couch, or any furniture in general...in reality most people can't afford to have handmade heirloom furniture in every room of their house. But I have been so turned off by what I have learned about the crate and barrel and pottery barn type places that I don't even know where to shop for cheaper things, or suggest to friends and family who ask where to buy stuff at. I am thinking of hitting up some antique stores around the area to see if I can find any interesting pieces to fill out my home. Of course...that will be on hold until Coronavirus gets under control.

Restoration Hardware moves all around suppliers, both foreign and domestic. They deliver an inconsistent product. Some of it is very nicely done, other pieces I see are definitely sub-standard. They don't have unity in their product standards across suppliers. So if you go to buy RH, use what you learn here on the forum, trust your eyes and senses and buy smartly.

Alan Price, who was one of Hancock and Moore's best Independent Contract Designers has just gone exclusive with Restoration Hardware for designs and his creations will be built by Sherrill. I am going to miss Alan terribly at Hancock and Moore, and while I don't know all the particulars of the change, I know the deal had to be exceptionally sweet for Alan to make that move. Alan brought so many cool designs to H&M like the Boomerang Chairs, Tavern Sofas, Monaco / French Curve....the list goes on and on. If was shown in a burnished leather, it was probably Alan's. I am told the RH designs will not look like H&M, and Sherrill knows how to build good pieces. I doubt they will be inexpensive, however. You will probably see his designs at RH late this year.

After reading an article where someone bought a piece from RH that was advertised a being kiln dried with 8 way hand tied springs, but when it arrived it had a squeak so when they turned it over the frame had chinese writing and it had sinuous springs...I don't think I would ever buy from them just on principle. It's too bad but Alan Price is going over to them. I am sure they are able to offer their designers a good pay with all the money they make.

Originally Posted by mwinchester

Well, I have been at my nearby Pottery Barn store they are damn good. I love to be there when I'm free so as to shop there. I never felt as you felt reading the article as I always make sure that I'm left update with Pottery Barn Price Match and return policy in order to make a saving. Pottery Barn only price match for those products or furniture that are specified on their website as price match guarantee.

I mean good luck with that but I'm on a pretty large local moms group and I can confidently say that pottery barn stuff will last a couple years before becoming saggy and people are always trying to dump theirs and asking for furniture store recommendations. The stuff is not worth anywhere near the cost.

Ha-Ha, Jennifer, that was a spammer - see his embedded link? He got you! lol. He's now been banned, so I got him !

Originally Posted by drcollie

Ha-Ha, Jennifer, that was a spammer - see his embedded link? He got you! lol. He's now been banned, so I got him !

I should have known! haha.

Might want to edit the link out of the quoted text too.