White/cream sofa, with young children?

[JamesAndTheGiantBanana]

I have a small north facing living room, with two 2 seat klippan sofas from ikea which I bought with fire engine red covers as I thought they'd be "cheerful" - I must have been mad! I can't stand them any more, they dominate the room, and nothing wipes off them at all so they're constantly covered in ming from the kids, some of which doesn't come out in the wash.

I've taken them off and my living room now looks light and airy so I'm thinking about buying new white or cream covers from ikea, with the reasoning that at least I can bleach out any marks - would I be mad to even contemplate cream fabric sofas with kids? what should I do?

Ooh no, I wouldn't!

How about something light (creamy/beigey) with a bit of a fleck in it?

The cream covers do get really grubby, really quickly and seem to be off the sofa more than on - but at least they are relatively cheap. I have some dark blue covers too that my Dp prefers but I dislike them - prefer the cream asthetically. BEMZ are a company that make covers to fit IKea products - they have some lovely fabrics but Klippan covers start from about £100 but they have patterned and flecked etc which would disguise ming a bit more.

I tried this with new sofas - expensive mistake! Now have Ikea brown leather until the children are older - wet wipes solve everything. Cream looked lovely but was never clean for long.

I have cream cheapo ikea covers
cover the arms and the seat in cream throws
much easier to wash them than the actual cover

I used to have removeable covers you could bung in the washing machine - Habitat. It was good except they never properly fitted after the first wash and then the zips broke.

Assuming Ikea's are better quality, is that a solution?

would you consider leather? we have a cream leather sofa - which actually nicer than it sounds. and it wears fantastically

Do it. It will look lovely. Set aside a slush fund for replacements if the DC's ever really destroy them... but bleach and Napisan will sort most stains short of biro. If you're lucky they'll last 3... 4... maybe 5 or more years!

If not, at least you'll have enjoyed looking at the peaceful white beauty of them for a while... as much as you would enjoy looking at a bunch of flowers that costs £££, and how long would THEY last?

That's how I think of it

How much does scotchguarding cost?

I have a creamy-beigey-brown sofa with flecks in that came scotchguarded & it has so far (6yrs) absorbed all stains without showing any of them. (although DD is only 2, so there is still time!)

I once spilt half a glass of red wine on it (wasteful I know), I mopped it up with kitchen roll & decided I would deal with the mess in the morning... When I looked in the morning, I couldn't tell where I had spilt it!!!

We had a cream sofa for years with 4 dc's.Yes it used to get dirty but it was very easy to whip it off for washing.We had a second one as well that we could put on right away.The only thing i would say is that ours was an ikea yellowy/creamy one.We had to bleach the whole cover initially to white so we could bleach off any stains subsequently.Its actually also nice to have a winter cover in a warmer colour and a cream/white for summer to ring the changes.

Thanks, I know leather is probably the ideal option with kids, can't really afford a new suite though . For now I might go for cheapo cream throws which I can whip off and wash easily, while I decide what to do! No idea how much scotchguarding costs, but surely it wouldn't save a white canvas sofa cover being attacked with a banana?

I have cream ikea sofas, they get covered in stuff but so far it's all washed out. Wash them every 4-6 weeks usually

Scohtguard works well but washes out after about 5-6 wqshes and with crean covers thwy will still need to be washed regularly. James.... Ektorp sofas in Ikea are at a really good price at the moment and are surprisingly hard-wearing with kids.