Knock on wood, not likely

Shakespeare wrote “All the world’s a stage,” and apparently, today’s furniture isn’t much more than set dressing.

There’s a growing unrest in me about the poor quality of commercial goods these days, specifically home furnishings. I grew up with a mother who had a bend for antique furniture and a father who is a woodworker, so perhaps I’ve been spoiled by things made of wood. What I consider “real” furniture.

Owning and managing the Sun Day keeps me almost impressively busy, but over the past couple weeks, I’ve managed to eek out some time to redo our master bedroom, which has needed it for nine years.

A new décor in order, my wife went out looking for one or two small pieces of furniture to match and came across an item that she liked on clearance at a big-box furniture store. She came home, got me, and brought me back to see it. What I found when we got there astounded me and nearly made my blood boil. The item she liked was not the one in question, as her favorite piece actually had been bought in the time it took her to get me and come back.

But sitting next to the empty spot in the display that marked where the piece my wife liked had been stood a console table, about 3’H X 2.5’W X 6”D with a nice paint job, decorative scroll work on its slender doors, and ornate little handles that you couldn’t resist operating. A cute, attractive thing. I noticed it was marked DAMAGED and was on clearance for $130 (reduced from whereabouts $200). Not bad. Then I saw the chunk taken out one of its corners. A little thing like this doesn’t normally dissuade us. As I mentioned, my father is woodworker, and my wife’s uncle is a master at furniture restoration. But as I looked closer, I realized that this piece didn’t need a woodworker or a master at furniture restoration. It needed to be tossed in the recycling bin because it was made from cardboard. Cardboard!

I learned a long time ago that a lot of furniture, most of it, in fact, was made from particle board. I gritted my teeth and bared that bad realization, but I don’t think I could bare this. I especially can’t bare what I found a little farther down the line from the cardboard console, where a cabinet stood, about the same design as the aforementioned console, but of lesser quality. Yes, lesser quality. This cabinet, too, was marked DAMAGED, a corner (in approximately the same place as the other’s) broken off to reveal not cardboard, but paper. Very thin sheets of pressed paper thinner than the paper you’re holding right now. I peeled one off. If I had a pen with me, I could have written on it—perhaps the price, $150 marked down from $220.

I thought about the piece my wife liked, which actually had been real wood—something that was obvious to her by the 6” long split that marred the face of the console table’s only drawer—what had dissuaded her from making the purchase herself. Obviously, the console’s new owner had the skills necessary to repair that split in the wood, but I took immediate pity on the other furniture’s future buyers, because unbeknownst to them, they would be spending something like $200 for a cardboard box, or maybe even a paper box.

My word to the wise, when looking for furniture: stick to the mom-and-pop places like Strode’s Furniture in downtown Huntley. The only paper you’ll find in places like these is for packing.

How much ‘wood’ you pay for a cardboard box?

---

---