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Hacking IKEA Furniture

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Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#141

Post by cromka »

NegativeLatency wrote: post #82
riffraff wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what is worth, I had an IKEA kitchen for 12+ years, we disassembled it and gave it to some people that could reuse it, and it's still fine. OTOH my IKEA couch fell apart in half that time, but my wife fixed it up and it lasted until we renovated. We gave that away too. IKEA has a wide range of products, some fall apart quickly, some last longer.

The finger jointed pine stuff is much more robust than the mdf or hardboard products.

IKEA does stuff not out of MDF and cardboard?

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#142

Post by pessimizer »

clickety_clack wrote: post #125
MomsAVoxell wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>IKEA had done more to evolve the public taste than any other manufacturer. I have lived and worked around a fair chunk of the western world, establishing my local headquarters each time, building myself a home. Long, long ago, I gave up on IKEA for everything except cookware and meatballs. The reason? I grew rapidly tired with seeing my living room everywhere. Move across the US, get invited over for dinner with new…

IKEA is fine when you’re just starting out, but after years, you realize that it’s got a shelf life. Good furniture really is better. You can get great stuff for very reasonable prices on Craigslist and Facebook marketplace, and it’s much more solid, durable and interesting than the cookiecutter ikea stuff.

Some of it is very good, although you have to dig to find it. They use real wood in many pieces; it's not all disposable.

I don't think that the good stuff is popular, though, and it certainly isn't highlighted. When a durable (often secretly classic) design slips in, it doesn't last more than a few years. The price is usually too high and it's usually too heavy (for their audience, not for me.)

I've still got some really elementally designed and sturdy mounted shelves from them that I've carried from place to place, and installed and removed many times, for the past 30 years. They were probably discontinued 28 years ago; I couldn't find them in back catalogs and AI couldn't even help. I would have started to doubt that I got them from IKEA except that I have one set of components that is still in the packaging. It's simple steel and simple wood, and the wood (IKEA pretending like a plain flat wooden board is a product) is easily replaceable.

I have to be honest, I don't really value furniture that is heavy for the sake of it. I like hippy-futons, simple wooden tables with drawers and removable legs, transformer chairs*, etc. Being able to be disassembled and easily moved or stored is something I value, and being able to be flattened against a wall so the room can be temporarily reconfigured (a requirement for colonial US furniture) is ideal (double drop-leaf tables are wonderful.) Wood and steel are durable, and simple designs with standard hardware are easily reparable.

[*] https://www.core77.com/posts/58815/Different-Design-Approach...

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#143

Post by coldtea »

bborud wrote: post #69

An architect friend of mine once said that he admired IKEA above all other furniture manufacturers because it made a modern range of aesthetics available to the masses. IKEA had done more to evolve the public taste than any other manufacturer. And I do have to agree. I can remember what ghastly furniture most shops used to have around here. There was a lot of what we call "cabin furniture" - which isn't made to look…

>it made a modern range of aesthetics available to the masses

It made lack-of-aesthetics available to the masses: the same monopoly pre-selected designs for everybody, saturating every home.

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#144

Post by engineer_22 »

unsupp0rted wrote: post #136
MomsAVoxell wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>IKEA had done more to evolve the public taste than any other manufacturer. I have lived and worked around a fair chunk of the western world, establishing my local headquarters each time, building myself a home. Long, long ago, I gave up on IKEA for everything except cookware and meatballs. The reason? I grew rapidly tired with seeing my living room everywhere. Move across the US, get invited over for dinner with new…

I don’t understand this at all. Everybody has my phone and my AirPods, or a model close to them, and that’s fine. I don’t need my AirPods to have a monogamous relationship with me.

To be truly fashionable, one must be /ahead/ of fashion

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#145

Post by mc32 »

unsupp0rted wrote: post #136
MomsAVoxell wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>IKEA had done more to evolve the public taste than any other manufacturer. I have lived and worked around a fair chunk of the western world, establishing my local headquarters each time, building myself a home. Long, long ago, I gave up on IKEA for everything except cookware and meatballs. The reason? I grew rapidly tired with seeing my living room everywhere. Move across the US, get invited over for dinner with new…

I don’t understand this at all. Everybody has my phone and my AirPods, or a model close to them, and that’s fine. I don’t need my AirPods to have a monogamous relationship with me.

iPhones and speakers (headsets, earsets) are accessories, furniture is more permanent (unless it’s near-disposable). You don’t typically update furniture every two to three years (with exception for people who like to show off their wealth and remodel every four years).

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#146

Post by cannonpr »

bborud wrote: post #69

An architect friend of mine once said that he admired IKEA above all other furniture manufacturers because it made a modern range of aesthetics available to the masses. IKEA had done more to evolve the public taste than any other manufacturer. And I do have to agree. I can remember what ghastly furniture most shops used to have around here. There was a lot of what we call "cabin furniture" - which isn't made to look…

I’m not sure I understand this perspective, I’m looking forward to inheriting some of my parents furnitures and getting rid of some of the ikea crap.. they are furniture that have been in the family in some cases for over 200 years, and I learned to maintain them and care for them as a kid just as a regular part of housework. Some have had amusing changes in use as the times changed, like an old wardrobe being turned into a chest of drawers as larger wardrobes became available, etc.

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#148

Post by [deleted] »

Ylpertnodi wrote: post #22
a3w wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 2014, IKEA made headlines when its legal team sent a cease-and-desist letter to Jules Yap, the founder of IKEA Hackers, demanding that she hand over the domain name. Good to see the site still online, after the PR department took note that legal teams were not-only filing useful claims. Ever since then, I avoid sharing pictures of IKEA furniture. Like Mattel, suing barbie blogs of children. If I did not design it,…

> Even building architects will sometimes sue if you photograph the house. ? In the US there's the 1a - you can photograph anything you can see (from a public place). In the there's the assumption you can photograph anything without a 'do not photo, military dogs' etc. Never heard of a non-publishable building. Even gchq can be photo's.

[deleted]

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#149

Post by class3shock »

I can't stand Ikea furniture quality but am often confronted with the only option for higher quality being an order of magnitude more expensive. Where is the middle ground between a Stickley Morris chair and an Ikea chair?

Also their particleboard and cardboard furniture should be banned. Furniture should not dissolve when a drink gets spilled on it.

Re: Hacking IKEA Furniture

#150

Post by teiferer »

cannonpr wrote: post #146
bborud wrote: post #69

An architect friend of mine once said that he admired IKEA above all other furniture manufacturers because it made a modern range of aesthetics available to the masses. IKEA had done more to evolve the public taste than any other manufacturer. And I do have to agree. I can remember what ghastly furniture most shops used to have around here. There was a lot of what we call "cabin furniture" - which isn't made to look…

I’m not sure I understand this perspective, I’m looking forward to inheriting some of my parents furnitures and getting rid of some of the ikea crap.. they are furniture that have been in the family in some cases for over 200 years, and I learned to maintain them and care for them as a kid just as a regular part of housework. Some have had amusing changes in use as the times changed, like an old wardrobe being turned…

> I’m looking forward to inheriting some of my parents furnitures and getting rid of some of the ikea crap..

I think you are confusing the perspective of the GP here.

Your perspective is that of the "kid". You like the parents' furniture and eventually want to use them and that's all fine.

But GP is describing the parent perspective which, they argue, shouldn't be to plan life such that the kids will be inheriting and using things later. That puts pressure on them to actually do instead of making their own choices. It's a subtle but important difference.

I see similar issues with people buying the neighboring lot and building a second house there such that eventually their kids can move in their with their family, once they have one. Some kids certainly so, and that's great. But think about your own life, would really have wanted to do that? Or grow up feeling that's expected of you? Most of my friends live half a day of travel away from where they grew up. Most of them would despise the idea of moving in next to their parents. Which doesn't mean they don't love them, just that they value their independence and made choices free from the constraint that it needs to be exactly there. (Besides, a couple usually consists of two people and they often didn't grow up in the same neighborhood.)

Generally, trying to plan for leaving inheritances (of substantial value) is overvalued. Modern society is striving to less dynasty building and I think that's a good thing. A lot of the poor/rich divide is rooted in that and governments should discourage it (through inheritance tax) rather than encouraging it (through e.g. lack of actions against housing costs which forces people to get a big inheritance to be able to live anywhere.)

Though I'm really getting too far from the topic as that was about furniture. :)

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