Chesterfield sofa needs recovering

[mypropertea]

Having a battle with dp over our much loved sofa. It was brought off a family friend and is about 30 years old. It is covered in leather.

Unfortunately, the years and cats (past owners and ours) have not been kind and it is getting to the stage where it needs to be fixed or replaced.

Dp wants to replace it as he says it will never be as nice if it is reupholstered.

I want to get it reupholstered in leather and have new foam in the cushions. Because it has a good frame and I love it's size, shape and stile.

Has anyone had a Chesterfield reupholstered and if so, who by and were you happy with the result? Also if it isn't too cheeky, how much was it?

Thanks :)

Am not sure on actual prices but, to be honest, it's often cheaper to buy new than have reupholstered these days. And you won't know how good the frame is until it's stripped down.

If you do that, contact a local college that teach upholstery as they might be glad of a free piece of furniture in your old Chesterfield to use as a 'project'.

Where in the country are you? I know a specialist. Always better to restore than replace!

We have a similar age and condition chesterfield, in dark olive.
DH originally trained as an upholsterer and says they are a lot of effort. So we have new foam seat cushions, covered in cowhide fabric, original leather was too shot to retrieve. The rest has had a good hide feed. Should get us another few years, then we will buy new.
Only restore if you are sure the frame is brilliant.

Oh dear, looks like I am going to loose this one. I am in south east England.

Get a quote. I had two Victorian winged armchairs reupholstered last year. Didn't have the backs rebuttoned (but it would have added a few hundred more). Used JL sale fabric so that was only just under £200.

It was £1500. Worth it because the chairs belonged to my great grandparents and are rather lovely. To buy similar quality new would have cost much more,

Get a quote. I doubt that it will be cheaper than buying a new sofa, but a frame that is 30 years old and going strong is probably far better quality than anything you can buy now. I can understand your dh's doubt about re-upholstery never being as good a the original. My mum and I have both had some awful replacement loose covers, but I imagine upholstery should be OK as it is fitted on to the frame. There is an upholsterer down the road from me and the stuff k have seen of hers is lovely.

We had two Victorian Chesterfields for 20 years, covered twice over that time, at a reasonable price. The next time the quote was £3000! Midlands prices.

We decided to have new sofas.

I think £3000 is very reasonable. One chesterfield costs more than that!

I got quotes to put loose covers on 2x2 seater sofas, they were FAR more than I paid for the sofas, have just bought covers from Ikea. One chap who came lout said unless the sofas were really expensive or are in really good condition, if you have to to work to frame, strings,wadding,foam, it is cheaper to buy new.