Navy or emerald sofa - fading?

[User4223131]

We’re going to be doing a coloured velvet sofa and currently looking at maybe navy or emerald although I haven’t picked an actual style yet!

Main question - how are they for fading? With the room that they’ll be in it’s pretty unavoidable that parts of them will get more sun than others 🤔 I’m worried they’ll go patchy quite quickly?

Can anyone who has a bold coloured sofa recommend any in particular? I’ve seen ones I like at Loaf, Sofology & Snug. Huge differences in price.

Navy shows a lot of hairs and dust ect. X

@allboysherebutme Not a point that I’d even thought of! Thank you 😊 We don’t have any pets and are unlikely to have in future so hair isn’t a big concern but dust sounds annoying!

We have Sofa.com sofas in Armour, which is dark grey but looks more like a dusty navy in our living room. It hasn't faded yet (though to be fair, they've only been in a few weeks!), and I totally love them!

I've a dark green velvet sofa from made.com, 5.5 years old. Horribly faded. I have a throw on one armrest to disguise it. Getting replaced very soon.

@QuantumWeatherButterfly Thank you. I seen some beautiful sofas on there. What’s the quality like?

@SwimmingOnEggshells That’s what I thought might be the case. Our room has a very large window and the sofa will definitely get far more sun on one end. I think I might look at different fabrics. What’s the quality from made.com like other than the fading obviously?

Not good, imo. The back cushions were filled with feathers so they never kept their shape. I had to go to an upholsterer to get them filled with foam. I also completely forgot that we flipped the base cushion because it was so badly faded. We have a large west facing window in the room which did all the damage.

I have the Loaf pudding sofa in navy blue. We've had it for four years and it is in a bay window that gets the morning sun. I have a throw over the back because I was worried about fading and it really hasn't been a problem. The dust does show a bit but it doesn't look terrible, I just hoover it about once a week.

@SwimmingOnEggshells Doesn’t sound ideal 😳 we have the same issue with windows so I think it might be time to rethink the bold coloured sofa! Haha.

@aftonwater Thanks 😊 ours will get the sun right through the afternoon so hoping for something that wont fade too obviously. Off to rethink my colour choice!

I am having the same dilemma about sofas in our south facing room. We are going to have a uv filter film applied to the windows to stop, or at least reduce, the fading. Might this be worth considering? You can buy the film and diy it or there are companies that specialise in this.

We have the joules patterdale in dark green velvet, it's next to a big bay window and no fading as yet (think we've had it 2 years)

We got it from DFS. It does need brushing down with the sort of brush you remove lint from suits with but it doesn't take long

I have green, have had it a number of years, don’t think it’s faded too badly but I am religious about putting blind down half on sunny days/tilting shutters. Recently bought a navy one too and it does show dust/hairs which I knew, depends how much it irritates you. In my opinion the worst colour for fading is blue . That sort of mid blue , not so popular now.

I have a navy velvet Tetrad sofa in a north facing sitting room. It's at the window.
It's a room that's not used very often, perhaps 3 times a year, it doesn't get a lot of wear and tear at all.
The velvet on the top of the sofa at the window completely disintegrated and the white lining of the sofa is all that can be seen, and Tetrad didn't want to know.
Because we have had the sofa for 18 years it was obviously out of any guarantee.
We actually have two of the sofas in the room. The other one is fine. No wear and tear really.
I certainly wouldn't get navy ( almost like silk velvet ) velvet again for the position by the window. The fabric was too fine.
As a solution I managed to get a navy velvet piece to cover the entire length of the top of the sofa. It will have to do.
So for your sofa get good strong material and keep it away from a window and the sun.