Upholstery in
Brighton

Brighton sits on the bay in Melbourne's south, a suburb of big family homes on generous blocks, with living areas that open onto decks and gardens and catch the afternoon light. A north or west facing room takes hours of direct sun every day, a lounge parked in front of the glass fades along one side long before the rest of it wears out, and salt in the air finds its way onto anything metal.

Brighton is a long run south and west of Eltham North, roughly 35 km, but well inside the area we collect from. Pickup is arranged for a day that suits you, the piece is photographed and measured at the door, and it travels straight to the workshop. The suburbs bordering Brighton are on the same footing, so Elwood, Elsternwick, Brighton East and Hampton can be collected the same way, and Bentleigh, a little further east, can be folded in.

The work follows the houses. Bigger rooms mean bigger sofas, often a three-seater with a pair of armchairs or a full modular, and indoor-outdoor living means cushions for window seats, benches, day beds and outdoor settings that must survive weather most indoor fabric never sees.

Fade is the first thing we look at on a piece from a sunny room. A fabric that has lost its colour has usually lost strength too, because the ultraviolet light that lifts the dye also breaks down the fibres. Pull a faded cover tight over new foam and the weakened side splits, so patching is not an option. The honest fix is a full recover, and fade almost never reaches the frame, so under a sun-tired sofa there is usually a sound piece of furniture.

Outdoor cushions bring a different set of problems. Water gets into the fill and sits there, the cushion goes heavy and musty, zips seize, and stitching lets go along the seams that cop the most sun. We rebuild these from scratch: fill suited to outdoor use, outdoor-rated fabric dyed through the fibre rather than printed on the surface so the colour holds, and fresh zips so the covers come off for a wash.

Then there are the big family sofas, simply used more than most. Cushions gone soft and shapeless, arms worn shiny, a seat that dips where everyone sits. Those are foam, spring and cover jobs, done together so the sofa comes back feeling like one piece.

Fabric choice does most of the work. For a family sofa we recommend at least 25,000 Martindale rubs, and 30,000 or more with large dogs in the house. In a sunny bayside room we also look at how the fabric is coloured: yarn-dyed and solution-dyed cloths hold colour far longer than surface prints, and a decent light-fastness rating keeps the window side looking like the rest.

Inside the sofa we use Dunlop HR35 high-resilience foam, 200 density for a firm seat and 165 for a softer sit, both with Dunlop's ten-year warranty. Where the frame was built for coil springs we hand-tie them nine ways, and where webbing is the right answer we re-web. Salt air is hard on metal, so on a bayside piece we check spring clips, staples, zips and any recliner mechanism for corrosion and replace what has gone.

Strong sun also speeds up peeling on lounges. A cover that flakes or sheds in strips was bonded or PU leather, and the frame beneath it is usually fine. Real leather is sold by the whole hide, so a small repair is costly to do well; a close-match commercial-grade vinyl by the metre, wipeable and about the same per metre as entry-level leather, is often the practical answer, as our leather versus vinyl guide explains.

A cross-town job runs like this. You send a photo, we quote within 24 hours, and once you have chosen a fabric the quote is firm. We arrange a pickup day, photograph the piece and measure anything that must fit a particular spot such as a window seat. In Eltham North, upholstery, machining and French polishing all happen under our roof, so nothing goes out to a subcontractor. When it is done, delivery back to Brighton is arranged the same way.

The people doing that work have around a hundred years of trade between them: a restorer and French polisher with 50 years, a machinist with 30, an upholsterer with 22. We are fully insured, and any hardwood frame we build carries a 30-year guarantee on the frame itself. You are welcome to visit the workshop to see fabrics; it is a residential address, so call first. Drop-in dining seats can be turned around same or next day with notice, and a sofa takes about a couple of weeks once the fabric arrives, fabric lead time being outside our control.

Ours itemises the work: fabric with its rub count and metreage, the foam grade, springs or webbing, any frame repair, zips and trims, and the pickup and delivery run across town. Our aim is a high-end finish at a mid-tier price, pricing the hours the piece needs rather than a flat rate, so we are sometimes the lowest quote you receive and sometimes not. A quote well under what quality fabric and foam cost at wholesale has left something out, and in bayside sun, whatever was left out is what you notice first.