What is the best sofa for children and a cat?

[Lusi]

My sofa has finally died - yesssssss
So I am looking to get a new one.
Just wondering what kind I should go for?
The one I have now was inherited with the house..it is a brown fake suede like material...and I hate it. It shows every dirty fingerprint (and worse snotty nose mark!). It can be wiped with a damp cloth but only looks really clean by taking the covers off and putting them in the washing machine -which is a real chore...I have to wrestle the cushions to get them off and on...
Thinking maybe leather (dark colour) or easy remove covers or a pattern that won't show every mark
Any advice or recommendations????

do your cats scratch!

Leather sounds like the way forward to me, it'll probably date much less quickly than anything with a pattern too.

Happy shopping

my cats would rip a leather sofa to shreds!

We have EKTORP range from Ikea and it's been great for us. Two children and a big smelly dog. Trampolining, dens, sleepovers, spillages, sticky fingers and probably every bodily fluid you care to dream up. It washes fantastically - we even had a WHITE one and it comes up great. Doesn't seem to need washing all that often though, and the patterned one we had has hardly been washed at all .

I think leather is the way to go. We used to have a chenille 3 piece suite (purchased before we got the cats) and they ripped it to shreds. We eventually replaced it with 2 chesnut brown leather sofas and they don't scratch it (well, except for one bit where they were 'testing it out' - so I wouldn't buy a realy expensive one...)

Also, you just wipe the leather clean with a damp cloth so it looks good as new (well, apart from the bit the cats have scratched) 2 years on. We have 3 kids so it is constantly covered in fingermarks/raisins etc and it cleans up lovely. hth

mmmm, my cat hasn't scratched our current sofa...but has scratched the slighty padded wallpaper in the bathroom to pieces...which is going to be replaced with something less scratchy so she might transfer her attentions to the sofa...

My mum says that cheap leather sofas are no good as the leather is so thin that the slightest little hole will turn into a great big rip and it will be ruined ...Has anyone any experience with this happening? I think with children you are mad to spend a lot of money on anything that they can come into contact with!

I do think leather might be the way to go though....

We've got a cheap leather sofa, it's nearly 7 years old. The cats never bothered with it, it's still going strong apart from the grime is a bit ground in as it's pale blue.

Next time I'm going for a dark colour but will def get leather again.

Why not get rid of the cat(s)
then you can have the sofa of your dreams and not worry about it.

Go on, your neighbours will thank you for it!

Having had our sofa puked on twice today by two different DCs, I would definitely recommend leather. God only knows what it would be like now if it was anything but wipe-clean [bleurgh].

Ours is dark brown leather, we clean it with baby wipes. Looks almost as good as new despite many spillages and pukes...

I would say let them use the floor