Log off — and 7 more tips I swear by for furniture shopping |
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| Getty Images/Jeff Greenberg |
 | By Joshua Lyon Joshua is a writer covering home and decor (oh and Lego, too). |
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Over the past year, I’ve hurled my body onto well over 100 couches. I’ve visited furniture stores from New York to Montreal to Mexico. I’ve kept a straight face looking at $20,000 price tags for a single chair and subtly scraped my fingernail along the enamel of a show room table to see how easily it might scratch. (Quite easily, it turns out.)
Before any of those experiences, I already understood the value of shopping for furniture in person: getting to perform tests for comfort and sturdiness, or experiencing the IRL beauty or disappointment in a specific fabric texture or color can be a crucial part of the process. But one major benefit to in-person shopping that I’d never considered came as I spent more time chatting with customer service reps.
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By buying in-store, you get an actual human on your side when it comes to dealing with any issues that might arise. Someone with an on-the-ground, vested interest in making you happy so that they might get your return business. An advocate who will keep you away from customer service phone robots or faceless voices dropping you into the “let-me-transfer-you” circle of hell.
In a world increasingly filled with chatbots, I’ve found my in-person conversations to be an important (if not obvious) reminder of the value of face-to-face interactions.
All of that said, there are any number of reasons a shopper might not be able to make it into a store. We at Wirecutter try to do as much of that as possible for you — chatting with reps, flopping onto countless couches, even working from a bed in the middle of our office, as I did for our new nightstands guide. And we try to bring as much of that detail as possible forward in our furniture guides to help you shop smarter, both online and off.
To that end: Editor Daniela Gorny and I have rounded up the very best home-shopping tips we’ve uncovered over the years. Happy furniture hunting — from wherever it is you may be doing it.
- Be suspicious of marketing speak. If a product description mentions something you don’t understand, do some digging. For example, we often see furniture brands touting their “kiln-dried wood,” but this is like bragging that your Jell-O has been refrigerated. All wood used for furniture needs to be dried, and kiln-drying is the most common method. (One example: the wood on this sturdy platform bed we recommend.)
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- Have a swatch party. Sure, sometimes you need a couch fast, but trust me: If you can, give yourself an extra week to see what the various ready-to-ship fabric options look like in your space. It’ll save you a lot more time in the long run in the case you hate what you end up with. If you’ve narrowed it down to just a couple of options and are still undecided, try asking for bigger fabric swatches.
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- Measure, measure, measure. I use painter’s tape to map out the exact dimensions of a potential new couch on my floor and leave it there for at least several hours to get a realistic sense of how the sofa will work within my space. (Some companies like this one will even send you full-size printouts of their sofas to play with.) Don’t forget to make sure furniture can actually get inside your door, too.
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- Check out those legs. Got delicate hardwood floors? Unless you’re planning to place furniture on a rug (perhaps one of these good-looking ones?), you’ll want to avoid anything with hairpin legs, which can easily scratch your floors.
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- Think of the children. If you’ve got kids or pets, or are particularly spill-prone, be sure to select a performance fabric that will resist stains or removable covers that you can wash.
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- Do you want feathers in your nest? Down-filled cushions (like the ones that come with this luxurious and cloud-like couch) will need regular fluffing to keep a sofa looking put-together, whereas firm foam cushions will require less maintenance. Be honest about your willingness to regularly fluff your furniture’s cushions.
- Read the fine print. Warranties and return policies vary wildly across brands, and sometimes even a seemingly innocuous move (like using risers to gain a bit more height on your furniture pieces) will void your protection on them. Taking a moment to read the fine print on higher-priced furniture purchases is worth it.
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One last thing: These towels Daniela swears by are on sale right now |
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| Photo illustration: Dana Davis/NYT Wirecutter; source photo: Michael Murtaugh/NYT Wirecutter |
Daniela keeps these textured waffle towels — a Wirecutter favorite since 2018 — in constant rotation in her home. They are lighter, drape better, and dry faster than any terry towel we’ve tested. And they look luxurious and unfussy on the rack.
“All my houseguests ask me about my towels”→
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