What do the Simpson, Will & Grace, Friends and Married with Children all have in common?

Aside from being long-running TV series they all feature a damn good, and long-lived couch! So why are more of us going down the fast furniture route and not investing in a good quality sofa?

Founder and owner of Crafted Furniture, Justin Burden seems to think it’s our obsession with having whatever we want as quickly as possible, “It’s easy and its cheap, and it works – for now. The idea that you can just have a new mattress or couch delivered to you in 3 hours is definitely enticing, but at the end of the day you’re getting a product that will last a couple of years and then go to the tip.”

For most of us the couch becomes the centre of the household but at what point did we lose the idea that it was an investment piece? With COVID-19 battering out local industries it’s time to look in our own backyards for high-quality and Aussie made furniture.

According to Justin, “People really care about the design of the products they buy and achieving a certain look they have seen elsewhere is something that we are encountering much more.”

With so many Aussies are still embracing their inner Shaynna Blaze and obsessing over their interiors, we should be striving to do what is right by local industries and the environment at the same time. “The furniture industry is a part of this, the amount of materials that get used to produce a sofa is staggering, and then for that sofa to be discarded within a couple of years is disappointing” Justin says, “Poor quality products made from MDF, chipboard and other such materials are especially wasteful as there is no chance for these products to last a long time”.

Like the gang on Friends, if we as consumers want to “pivot” our consumer direction we need to first look inwards, not at ourselves but rather at the materials that make up the furniture we buy. The fight against fast furniture begins by encouraging environmental sustainability and ethical labour practices whilst minimizing wastage and reducing their carbon footprint. Justin agrees with this sentiment, “We want to leave the world a better place, whether it’s using materials that don’t further degrade the environment or ensuring that we don’t exploit labour in developing countries.”

So much like the public shift away from fast food, we are slowly learning that we need to furnish our homes with the same care and respect that we look after our bodies, after all it is called a ‘living’ room not an ‘existing’ room. If you are fixated on keeping up with the latest trends, your furniture can be re-purposed, re-adapted and re-covered rather than simply binned. You’ll not only save your hard-earned dollars but also helping out the planet one cushion at a time.

To view Crafted’s furniture collections, full range of fabric options, or to discuss a custom requirement, head here 
IG: @craftedfurnituresydney | FB: @Crafted.Sydney

Sydney showrooms:
Rushcutters Bay –137-141 Bayswater Rd, Ruschutters Bay, NSW
Crows Nest – 378 Pacific Highway, Crows Nest, NSW