IKEA -vs- Crate & Barrel -- Cage Match!!!

Dear Diary,
I bashed my head against the wall this morning, by accident this time. Raised quite a lump, but it was no match for a bag of Trader Joe’s frozen corn. I can’t wait for the awesome bruise. Well, I guess that’s all for today.

We are furnishing the place, bit by bit. We decided to ditch our couch(es), dining room table and chairs, end tables, desks, and bookshelves when we moved, so we’ve been spending a lot of time at stores on this end.

Two weeks ago, we went to IKEA. I look back on this trip as akin to a hostage situation. There is no leaving that place. You enter through the pickup/garage area, which places you far from the outer walls. Then you “follow the arrows” that are on the floor so you don’t accidentally miss a section (the HORROR!). There are bathrooms, periodically.

We ended up with a bookshelf unit (cubes that hold file boxes or books) and a wardrobe/dresser “solution”. At IKEA, you put everything together yourself, and much of the wardrobe section was highly modular. So we bought tall wardrobe cabinets (3), doors (3), shelves (12), and clothes rails (3). Thusly, we would have approximately 5’ of closet space, and shelves for placing shirts, etc. The whole thing takes up a 2 x 5 footprint in the room.

Naturally, I’ve been the furniture assembler. The wardrobes actually went together nicely. I was impressed with the simplicity of the design, the sensible hardware, and the quality of the prepared materials. I was a little put off by all of the particle board (I hate being surprised by the old glue’n sawdust), but the price was definitely right, and we were more than pleased with the sturdiness of the final product.

Like many bookshelf units, the wardrobes came with a thin piece of wood to serve as the back. You assemble the unit on its face, then lay the back piece on and tack it in with 40 nails. When I first placed the back on, I was sure that it was slightly too big. But then I ran my finger along the edge with some pressure, and it slid right into place. It made almost a Ziplock "vacuum seal" noise as I pressed it in. They also provided a handy little device that holds your tack for you at the perfect distance from the edge. Speaking as someone who's assembled his share of Target furniture, this is pretty outstanding manufacturing.

Yesterday, we received an order from Crate and Barrel of 2 nightstands, a desk, and a bed. I spent several hours putting together the nightstands and desk, which largely used the same cam-screw and dowel peg assembly as the IKEA stuff. First of all, I was unpleasantly surprised to realize that the nightstands were largely made of particle board with veneer. All of the IKEA stuff was, too, but IKEA is orders of magnitude cheaper than Crate and Barrel. The desk was made of actual wood, but many of the pre-drilled holes were too small, and some were off the mark.

Driving screws into hardwood when the pilot hole is too small by hand is not a lot of fun. Further, often when I would start a screw in the particle board pieces, the veneer would tear away, leaving a crater. Granted, these screw holes are hidden from view, but I was reminded that this did not happen with the much cheaper IKEA stuff. So I guess that this is evidence that IKEA actually is a bargain, and is (almost) worth spending the time there to find something.

Oh, and it was this morning, while picking up the Styrofoam from the boxes, that I swung my body around and introduced my noggin to the wall (plaster like concrete), with not insignificant follow-through. Given that I’m caring for an infant, I should probably try not to knock myself out cold. Have to put a reminder in my diary.

UPDATE: Score a few more points for IKEA. The tabletop of that desk that we got from C&B (Espresso Loop desk) developed a pronounced sag, so we had it replaced. A few weeks later, the replacement desk also acquired a sag. Next step is to arrange for a refund or store credit. On the plus side, C&B was very gracious about the desk replacement, and hopefully this attitude will prevail when we go about requesting a refund.