Taking the Custom Furniture Plunge

I've noted that our place is small at around 800 square feet, so it presents some design challenges. It is, for the time-being, a vacation destination and that influences our process as well. So we've been working with Amanda and Emma at Montgomery Kalsh Interior Design to get it right. As part of the process, we met recently at the showroom of Design Furnishings International in Northwest Portland to have a fitting for our new sectional. We picked the fabric with Emma and Amanda, and the team at DFI will manufacture the piece to Emma's design specs (image). So Emma, my partner Lupe and I gathered to meet with Mathew, DFI's showroom manager and resident wit.

I had thought the art of pithy conversation to be lost until I began to chat with Mathew. Not only did we all learn more about human anatomy than we probably needed to know, but we also had a delightful conversation in the process. Thrust and parry, rejoinders and repartees, the kind of conversation that requires attention and rewards it with insight and humor.

DFI builds high-quality, custom furniture for the design trade right in Portland. The firm uses solid Alder frames paired with hand-tied springs or Sinuous Arcs, and in-house craftsmen add unique character with hand carved elements that can reflect a variety of classic or contemporary styles. What's not to love? High-end fabric, custom manufacture with quality components, and personal fitting. We're excited to see and chill on our new piece.

So what's involved in a sofa or sectional fitting? Depth, seat height, over-all scale, seams, angles and feet can all be adjusted to best fit our needs. We sat in a variety of pieces, at a variety of heights to get things started. Since we're not ginormously tall, okay, even average height, we selected an appropriate height and depth for our piece. Then we checked-out arm rest heights and arrived at a suitable measurement. We chatted about seams, and discussed the over all look. After this bit of work and quite a bit of enjoyable conversation we left happy. Following the meeting, we made one adjustment on the seaming based on feedback from DFI and the consent of our designer.