We have an old sala set that has been with us since our old house. I have no idea when my grandparents bought it, but by all accounts, it’s made with narra wood, and I’m told they don’t make narra furniture anymore, so there is no way that we are ever letting this set go 🙂
So this sala set has been through a lot. It was the main sala set in our old house, and during that time, the original upholstery had already split at the seams.
When we moved to our current home, I had them reupholstered with a nice, light striped upholstery canvas cloth. I was so naive to think that we could maintain it. The first reupholstering was done by someone one of our staff referred, one of her neighbors, I think, and the quality wasn’t great. Also, instead of using a natural, “see through” varnish like I expected, he painted it with a dark brown paint. After only a year, the sala set looked stained and awful that I swore that I would never upholster furniture with “cloth” again. Leather / leatherette all the way from now on! I coped by sewing old bed sheets and table cloths into makeshift covers until I could get them reupholstered again.
SOFA REUPHOLSTERY JOB
We have another sofa set that is circa 1980s with really thick foam, but the original leatherette had already cracked. We also had it reupholstered, and this time, the job was done by a family friend but it was a shoddy job, too. But this is our “nice” sofa set and I was getting sick of the bad upholstery. We also had guests coming over to stay, so, four years ago, I looked for someone who would actually do a good job at reupholstering this set.
I found Villa Arca General Upholstery on sulit, if I remember correctly. So I called them, scheduled a visit so they could see the sofas, they had me pick the material to be used (they brought swatches) and they gave a quote. They said that they only use Uratex brand foam for their upholstery work because it’s the one that will really last and the foam is better. I also ordered a set of slipcovers for the sofas. I can’t remember exactly, but I think the total quote was a little over 20k for the long sofa, 2 single sofas, and slipcovers.
As expected, they asked for a down payment, and then they picked up the sofas so they could do the work at their shop. At first, I was hesitant about the down payment but just decided to trust them not to run away with the money.
After about a week, they delivered the sofas and they did a much better job than the previous upholsterers. The sofas were comfortable to sit on – firm but bouncy, and you can’t feel the wooden frame inside the sofa. The leatherette they used was good quality – thick and supple. Does it look as good as the original? No. But I can’t blame them because they haven’t seen the sofa in its original form.
About the only problem I have with these sofas are the wheels. The long sofa rolls fine. But the 2 single sofas don’t roll very well.
The slipcovers are really durable. We launder them every month because the cats like to jump on the sofas with dirty paws. It’s been 4 years and they’ve held up pretty well.
I don’t think they make sofas this long anymore:
A complaint I always have against sofas currently available at the malls is about the materials they use, and how the foam is so poor that you will literally feel the bones of the sofas just by touching them. The wood they use now is also not as sturdy as the ones used decades ago. So if you have inherited older furniture, think about fixing them up instead of buying new.
So two weeks ago, we decided to get the old narra sala set reupholstered. Finally! I really was getting sick of my makeshift covers. So I contacted Lani again and she came by to see the sala set. I also ordered a set of slipcovers. The quote was P15,500 for everything, including a coat of varnish, fixing the “umuuga” chairs, and fixing the wheels on the other sofa set.
She deals with a lot of furniture and she said that they don’t make ’em like they used to. The quality of the wood used in furniture now is just not as good. Without prompting, she confirmed that this set was indeed narra. It was just too bad that the previous upholsterer painted over the narra. If I wanted them to remove the brown paint, it would be a whole process of stripping the wood using Stripsol and would entail additional cost and time. She said that they would just do the best they can during sanding but won’t do the whole Stripsol process.
They asked for a down payment of 10k. I typically only agree to 50% down payment, but Lani explained that they needed to buy the Uratex foam. Okay. They also asked for additional down payment of 2k on the second visit when the mananahi came to measure the seats. This time, I said no because it was already too much for a down payment.
They would also be doing the work on site (in our garage) because they had a difficult time carrying our other sofa set 4 years ago because it was so heavy. This narra sala set is also very heavy.
So the mananahi pre-sewed the leatherette covers in the shop and all they had to do was “shoot” it when they reupholster. This type of chair consists of a wood frame, and the L-shaped foam chair part is removable (nakapatong lang).
We scheduled a day when they would come by to work, but they rescheduled. I wanted them to arrive on a day when I was available to oversee things, but they didn’t arrive because the mananahi got sick daw. They arrived on a day when I had to go out so I wasn’t able to check on the work until after I got back late afternoon and they were already finished.
Here’s what the newly reupholstered narra sala set looks like:
Overall, I’m happy with it except for the back support of the long sofa. I feel like the area where you rest your back on the chair isn’t as I had expected. I’m not sure if they should have added more foam in that area or maybe some spring. It’s just that the part near neck protrudes a little more. I feel like the part near the lumbar area should have been the one that was a bit more convex, instead of concave.
As for the “umuuga” issue with the chairs, it turns out that the the whole wooden chair base is done the old way – walang pako (no nails). To make the chairs stable, they had to use nails now. Lani told me that since this set is old, the wood might eventually break so it’s better to reinforce it with nails.
The reason the set is separated is because the house decor / decluttering is still a work in progress. The longer narra sofa is currently the chair in the entertainment room, and I’m thinking of creating a “reading nook” space with the 2 single chairs as soon as I clear out the space I am eyeing. We just don’t have the space for 2 salas. I still need to put up curtains because I want the new curtains to hang from the ceiling instead of the typical window height. I still need to work on putting up our photos on the wall. The whole house is really such a work in progress pa talaga. Mukha lang malinis but we have little clutter mountains in the corners that I try to work on a little bit every day.
Mostly these are things that need to be sold on Shopee or Carousell, old photos that need to be scanned, photos that need to be reframed and hung, and many things that are already old but people are still nanghihinayang to throw away kasi sayang.
They only delivered the slipcovers yesterday, so the cats already started scratching on the chairs the past few days. Sigh. 
Oh well, cat scratches on them are inevitable but I had hoped the chairs would stay nice for a bit longer.
Here are the new slipcovers, not yet laundered. They will look better once they’ve been washed and ironed, but for the meantime, we already put them on to protect the sofas from the cats:
Blogging this for personal reference, as well to help others who may be looking to reupholster furniture. I tend to forget things so it’s better that I write it all down, including the pros and cons, for next time.
Villa Arca General Upholstery
0955 190 2319
0933 237 9989
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