Finding good homes for vintage furniture....one sofa at a time!

Nothing makes us happier than to know that something we have sold is going to a good home. As we always say, we’re an adoption agency for furniture!

You may remember the case of the Purple People Eater. It was a huge purple sectional sofa we had in our old location a few years back. It was a gorgeous piece, custom built back in the 50’s for the original owner (one of the planners for Don Mills, Toronto’s most mid-century of mid century communities), and had been recovered a few times in it’s 50 plus years. 

Sofa in it's original Don Mills home

When it arrived in the store, it was sporting purple wool upholstery and looked brand new. We thought this monster would be around forever (which really didn’t bother us as it was sooo comfortable!) but we did sell it a few months later. The buyer was a client of our friend, Paul Dowsett, a LEED certified architect. His firm, sustainable.to is a green architectural practice, and focusses on providing sensible, sensitive and sustainable solutions for their clients. How appropriate (and green) is it that his client would buy vintage furniture!. His client decided to leave it in it’s purple glory which made us very happy as the wool fabric was in pristine shape.

Anyway, fast forward to yesterday, when I had an opportunity to visit the sofa in it’s new home. As you may or may not know, my husband is a columnist for the Globe and Mail (The Architourist) and he writes about architecture, specifically mid-century preservation, adaptive re-use and heritage topics. You can read all about the sofa’s new home in the real estate section of next Friday’s Globe and Mail (Friday September 28th), but in the meantime, here’s a sneak peek of the sofa in it’s new home.

There’s also an epilogue to this story. After visiting the home and interviewing Paul’s client, it was late and we didn't feel like cooking so we went out to dinner. Our waitress recognized me and told me that she and her boyfriend had bought a yellow sofa from me a few weeks back. I totally remembered them, and the sofa they bought. They are now really enjoying the Keith Muller & Michael Stewart designed and Precision Craftwood manufactured Image Series 2 seater sofa and they watch tv on it all the time! 

See you at the store!