[charanreddy]

I am big fan of hardwood. I have bought a few MDF type furniture from local market , but these start deteriorating and I can see powdered dust falling from them with in a few years.

My dad was into furniture business and the furniture we made for our home still stands and is very robust. Specifically :
* Dining table is close to 40 years old and looks great.
* 2 King beds , again 40 years old, have gone through a ton of abuse with us jumping on them as kids. Only one or two plywood base changes were needed.
* Sofa is 30 years old , Pooja mandir is 30 years old etc.

All the above furniture still serves us well in our home at the village.

At Bangalore, I have bought only hardwood furniture recently made of Sheesham wood. I find this to be a good mix of economy and strength. For reference, I bought my 6 seater dining table for 12K, my beds for 15-20K almost 6 years back and there is not even a hint of breakage or squeaking.

I am a big fan of places with VFM like the DMart, but I don’t see buying softwoood furniture from them even at a big discount.

[Rocketscience]

Originally Posted by qaqa

I have used plenty of engineered wood and softwood furniture that has lasted decades when cared for, as well as poorly put together plywood and blockboard contraptions which give way at the slightest force. It is not necessary that poor quality is the exclusive domain of softwood furniture.

As regards finishing, no local carpenter can give you the finish which a factory made piece can. Maybe it's just my experience, but most locally made plywood / blockboard pieces have poor fit and finish and end up using much more material with little to show for it.

I'am in no way expert on this but one of my friend is in plywood business, he told me that around 5 years ago they were actually under threat of business closure due to some strictness in cutting of forest trees for wood and it was almost banned for use.
But then almost miraculously these people started getting access to some tree which grows in 5 years and they claim there are huge farms built for specifically this purpose in Punjab and Haryana, they grow it for the sole purpose of selling it for wood to be used in plywood and furniture, this felt like a real win win situation to me.

Now, this is the only knowledge I have on this and people more informed than me can elaborate this further.

[GutsyGibbon]

Originally Posted by Rocketscience

But then almost miraculously these people started getting access to some tree which grows in 5 years and they claim there are huge farms built for specifically this purpose in Punjab and Haryana, they grow it for the sole purpose of selling it for wood to be used in plywood and furniture, this felt like a real win win situation to me.

Now, this is the only knowledge I have on this

I am no expert. When I go to a lumber yard, I look at the cross section of wood. Slow growth softwood or hardwood has tightly packed veins/rings. More character, more dense. Generally considered better.

Farm grown lumber is more temperate, and the rings are not dense as its grown quickly, and extreme temperatures are managed. Most big stores only have farm grown wood. Still better than particle board.

It's hard to source slow growth wood, I was able to source some for a dining table and coffee table only because someone brought a tree down on their private land, and wanted to get rid of it.

Good Plywood on the other hand is real wood, stuff like Baltic birch are sought after, and are better than wood for certain applications.

[Kapany]

My experience with plywood furniture has been mixed. For heavy use, I don’t think they last too long without creaking, cracking or showing their age. Which for me means constant replacement after every few years. Hence I have a bias against IKEA even though I am sure they make reasonably good quality furniture.
From a sustainability perspective, I would personally much rather have one, hardwood piece of furniture than rotate through multiple plywood pieces over a lifetime.

[Sebring]

My IKEA furniture has lasted a lifetime. Purchased in 2005, they're absolutely fine.

Originally Posted by Kapany

much rather have one, hardwood piece of furniture than rotate through multiple plywood pieces over a lifetime.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by AJITHAAA

The hard wood carpenters are more or less non existent in the cities and we can rarely find a skilled one in traditional green hubs like costal Karnataka, Kerala and interior Tamil Nadu(places I know).

Being from coastal Karnataka, I grew up knowing excellent carpenters. My dad had a transferable job, and we moved every 3-4 years, along with our furniture. Our furniture survived all those moves and finally replaced after 30-40 years when it started looking very outdated.

Woodworking as an art is dying since the demand for the art has come to an end. Look at the ancient homes thread, where I have posted many of the old homes from Coastal Karnataka, they are so heavy on woodwork. That is not needed right now.

When I opened an office in Manipal 15 years ago, I got all the office furniture made by a master carpenter. How do you recognise a master carpenter? He will make his own wooden dowel pins and use them for joints, and refuses to use nail and fevicol. Unfortunately, he passed away few years ago and his children didn't inherit the skill, they use nail/fevicol. But recently I discovered another carpenter who makes hardwood furniture in Udupi, and got an acacia wood cot made. It is lot cheaper, and very solid and superior to anything you can find in shops.

Meanwhile, I have got furniture made by inferior carpenters who used softwood/engineered wood, which started breaking down within few years. They feel so creaky and leave a foul taste when you look at it.

I have bought and used Ikea furniture heavily while living in USA, mostly hardwood furniture. None of them every broke or even damaged. I gave them all to my younger colleague when I left USA, and he used it for another 10 years before he left USA. But I am yet to experience Ikea furniture in India.

[Kapany]

Originally Posted by Sebring

My IKEA furniture has lasted a lifetime. Purchased in 2005, they're absolutely fine.

With respect, I think our reference points are different. We have furniture at our ancestral house which is more than 100 years old. You are talking about furniture which is 17 years old.´ Lifetime ´ means different things to different folks I guess.

[hemanth.anand]

This thread is like Cars from a previous generation and mechanics who could 'repair' them against new age cars and mechanics who can replace parts quickly.

I'm a fan of Ikea designs. Minimalist, Functional, customizable and very easy to assemble with basic tools. Just last week I assembled a chest of drawers and the end result was so satisfying. From Kitchen to children room to bath room to study room, I've purchased and assembled lot of necessary things from Ikea.

Having said that, I've old style solid wood furniture too. The cots, Sofas, cupboards all are from solid wood furniture. Fabindia and Woodenstreet are my favourite ones. The weight makes them super strong and will last generations, The "natural feel" that solidwood gives is unmatched. But weather conditions impact the operation and can get irritating at times

Ikea furniture or traditional furniture, both have their own charm, pros and cons and I have a fair mixture of both.

But Ikea is not just Furniture, the different collections that Ikea have can transform our home in a nice way. The way Ikea items make use of space makes them the Tata Indica of homes - More home per home.
And yes Ikea cafes is so famous in locations across the world that many people just go there just to have food.

Since 3-4 years now, I've been ordering so many things online from Ikea. If not for this online shopping, I'd have rushed to the Bengaluru store but now I'll wait for the initial rush to subside and visit it later.

[Sebring]

Dear Sir. I own legacy furniture at least 100 years old, passed on from my grandmother and my Dad - to me. Rosewood is my favourite. We have original Burma Teak furniture as well. These are timeless and will never be sold. The recent additions include a lot of 'solid wood' stuff from FabIndia. But IKEA has a place in our house too And they have lasted longer than what a 'disposable' item should, was my point

Originally Posted by Kapany

With respect, I think our reference points are different. We have furniture at our ancestral house which is more than 100 years old. You are talking about furniture which is 17 years old.´ Lifetime ´ means different things to different folks I guess.

[Kapany]

Originally Posted by Sebring

But IKEA has a place in our house too And they have lasted longer than what a 'disposable' item should, was my point

If IKEA works for you, then more power to you!
I have made a conscious decision to ´invest’ only in hardwood furniture. I have recently bought a restored 115 year old Burma teak bookcase. I feel buying restored furniture is best of both the worlds. Sustainable and durable.

[thanixravindran]

There is no question about the hard wood longevity and more importantly the beautiful carving works that can be done on some of them. In our grandparents time (60 years ago), everything was done in high quality teak wood during house building as well assorted furniture in the house which are still standing tall the test of times. In my parents time (30 years ago), teak wood was reserved for main doors with carvings (is called as 'Kadaisal' work in Tamil, we have a beautiful carved door) and other hard wood ('Vengai' is a high strength one) is used for doors, windows etc and low strength 'Padauk' is used in some internal doors. For furniture like cots, 'Manjakadambu' is extensively used. Some types of wood like 'Vengai' won't be used for dining chairs, cots or even floor wood frames that our feet touches as it is associated with divinity. Also, I still don't understand why even top stores offer Sheesham wood dining tables which is known for its poor water resistance property. Now in my time, in the builder built house, the windows are all become uPVC and doors are of unknown low strength timbers.

Overall, the usage of high quality timber in our homes has become inversely proportional to the mobility of the people living in house. In olden days, multiple generations lived in the same house and now I don't even know which is my next stop/home chasing my career and money (Forget about the next gen, I believe they will become international nomads).

The amount of time and effort you need to put to get a high quality timber and get it done with a quality carpenter is very high. First in today's generation, most won't know how to identify the different varieties of timber and there is a high chance of cheating by Timbermarts. If you have good timber available in your own Private (Patta land) land in your ancestral village land, you can at least make use of it. But in TN, the regulations are so stringent that you need permission from Forest department to fell, store and transport the trees (Teak and even Rosewood, forget about Sandalwood which you can sell only to Government, No such restrictions for other trees and that is the reason you see mostly Neem and Mango tree woods used widely) from your own private land. The amount of process and underhand dealings involved is not for faint hearted. So the trees planted by great grand parents and nursed by generations to be useful for future generations has been made futile by the corrupt system.

Coming to the Carpentry, we have very poor experience with carpenter 25 years ago. In TN, the unit of measurement in Sawmills is 'Kuzhi'. The carpenter has purposefully overestimated it by more than 20% all for some commission. Other thing is the selection of the tree and for house windows/doors one need a fully dried wood to have a control of expansion and contraction of wood after assembling. But our carpenter has chosen a semi-wet (Vengai) wood whose expansion resulted in cracks in the walls exactly near the windows. My experience was nearly same even all these years when I have to replace some and even coatings. This left us in poor taste and I simply don't have any stomach for another heartburn.

When we set-up our home, we mostly purchased from Home center with a mix of hardwood, machined particle board/MDF for different types of furniture. What I don't like is most of them are 'Made in China'. Have we become so dependent on China like West even for simple things like furniture? Before COVID, I visited Cambodia and I guess they are currently in the phase we were in 80s and have an excellent wood working industry. Beautiful carvings made on wood galore everywhere.

[Samurai]

Today (June 19th) was the house warming event of IKEA Bangalore. We had booked the 11am-12:30pm slot. However, we reached there at 10:30am itself thinking of parking problems. However, we need not have worried. That place has parking for few thousand cars in the underground itself.

And even though we were early, the shop was open and we could walk in right away. We were visiting an IKEA after 20 years, and it didn't disappoint. A fresh and innovative set of products with high quality was on display.

One floor is entirely for showcasing, you could pick some items there, but most items are on display, along with a tag describing where it could be found in the market hall or the self serve area in the lower floor. The details are mentioned here.

We didn't really pickup any items in the showroom, so our hands were free when we walked out of the showroom and into the restaurant area. We skipped the rice and meatballs so that we can avoid the crowd. The cakes, rolls and muffins were very good.

After that we visited the market mall and picked up plenty of items we had eyed in the showroom. We also wanted 6 dining chairs from the self-serve area, but they only had 4 pieces and I doubted even that would fit in the i10. So decided to order it online instead.

We eventually got out at 1:30pm, and it was a strange feeling pushing the giant cart all the way to the car and loading the car, it felt like Sam's club. We hadn't done that since leaving USA back in 2004. None of the shopping we do in Bangalore involve pushing a giant cart to a huge parking lot. Until now that is...

Edit: However, I noticed one big difference from my earlier IKEA experience. Almost nothing here was DIY unlike the IKEA products in USA.

[audioholic]

Visited Ikea for the housewarming today. Very well managed and crowd was handled pretty decently. But I suppose the crowd after inauguration will be higher and that’s going to be chaos. However when we reached the food court at 2PM there was a long queue. Billing also was sort of crowded even though they had more than 20 counters. We had a pretty large haul since lot of things were on the shopping list. So took till 5PM To return

[Gannu_1]

Looking forward to an IKEA outlet here in Chennai, whenever that happens.

Have been to an outlet just once which was in Dubai back in 2005 and the sheer amount of furniture on display (something which Home Centre and others have adopted to a much smaller scale) really blew me away.

We bought this light-weight, three-fold sponge mattress which was perfect for my hostel bunks/cots and it served me dutifully till I completed graduation. Quite an innovative thing really. We’ve usually seen just the rolled type mattresses but this helped immensely especially while vacating the hostel after the completion of that year - fold, carry it and store it in that room. Easier to spot which was mine in the store too. when we returned after the vacations.

I’ll be sure to visit the outlet. Especially their cafeteria section.

[Sebring]

How does one get an invite? I'm in their family

Originally Posted by Samurai

Today (June 19th) was the house warming event of IKEA Bangalore. We had booked the 11am-12:30pm slot.