Buying a sofa for your living room or your office space is one of the critical decisions to be made. A sofa can accentuate the vibe of the place and can be the greatest investment you have ever made. Else, it can also be the greatest nuisance of your life with a lot of headaches. It all depends on the type of sofa you choose according to your applications.
To break it down and help you steer towards the right decision, here are the pros and cons of leather sofa and fabric sofa.
Fabric Sofa vs Leather Sofa
When you enter an average home, you can typically find a homely fabric sofa tastefully decorated with decent upholstery. Fabric sofas are a common sight in living rooms of houses and have been a preferred option for home decorations due to the vast variety of designs, colors and textures it comes with.
On the other side, leather sofas can be found more in offices and business settings, and in houses where sophistication is a major appeal. Leather sofas exude style and can complement an aesthetically designed rich living room.
When you buy a sofa, it is important to consider the amount of time you are ready to invest in cleaning and maintaining it. Let’s dwell further on the pros and cons of picking a fabric sofa versus a leather sofa.
Comfort Over Everything
When you want to just crash on the sofa at the end of the day and feel comfortable at home, then fabric sofas are the best option. The type of material on the fabric sofas makes it breathable, thereby allowing for the free flow of air to and from the sofa. The leather sofas do not have any breathable space and tend to collect up the temperature inside.
Therefore, during the summer seasons, the leather sofas tend to heat up a lot and it can sometimes become quite unbearable in the tropical regions. On the other hand, fabric sofas are much cooler than the leather sofas during summer and provide a pleasant temperature during the winter seasons too.
Durability for Lasting Life
Most of us see a sofa as an investment and would expect to use it as long as we can. Therefore, the life of the sofa is another vital aspect to consider when weighing out the pros and cons. The leather has a much longer lifetime than the fabric materials and therefore, leather sofas are long-lasting. The fabric materials are less durable when compared to the leather sofas which is another reason to increase the longevity of the leather sofa.
There are a few ways by which you can increase the life of fabric sofa. You can get a good quality upholstery and keep changing it every few years. Cleaning the sofa regularly and maintaining it properly also helps.
Maintenance to Keep It as Good as New
In general, original leather sofas are easy to maintain than most type of fabric sofas. All it takes is a damp cloth to clean out all the dust particles from the leather sofa and make it look as shiny as a new one! Even if spill or stain the leather sofa, it is easy to clean it quickly, which is not the case with a fabric sofa. The stains on the fabric tend to set in quickly and it can be quite tricky to remove these stains.
The fabric sofa may also fade over time or with constant exposure to sunlight while leather sofa does not have any such issues.
However, there is one area where the maintenance of fabric sofa triumphs over the leather sofa – children and pets. When you have small kids or pets, they can easily scratch on the leather sofa and no matter what you do, these scratches cannot be removed.
Another point to note is that the leather sofa is hypoallergenic, which makes it the best option to choose when someone at your home has allergy issues.
Aesthetics to Styling
Leather sofas offer an aura of sophistication to the entire room where it is kept in. Without needing any exemplary designs, the sleek look of the leather sofa is all it takes to bring that stylish vibe. If you are the one to go for a bold yet simplistic look, leather sofas are your go-to choice.
Fabric sofas come in a variety of colors and designs which opens up many possibilities to style it. Adding to the fact that it is cheaper to get a fabric upholstery and change its design and color, fabric sofas can be used to change the mood of the room or spruce up space when it has become boring.
Cost Factors to Balance
The most important thing to know is that only good quality sofas can last longer and look fresh with proper maintenance. It may be tempting to buy a cheap imitation sofa that looks just like the pricey one. However, these sofas tend to lose its shine and start looking dull in just a few years and no amount of maintenance hacks could bring life to these sofas.
That said, the original leather sofas are a bit pricey when compared to the general fabric sofas. However, there are also a few varieties of fabric sofas made up of top quality materials that can be just as costlier.
Which One to Pick?
Now that we have discussed the significant pros and cons of leather sofas and fabric sofas, it is up to decide which of both fits into your requirements.
If you are looking for something stunning that blends in well with your living room at a decent cost or a sofa that will be continuously used, then you can go for a good set of fabric sofa, provided you do not have any pets or children.
If you are looking for something that looks luxurious for your office to be occasionally used or a lounge sofa to chill out in the sun, then leather sofas are the best.
Depending on your comfort levels, the frequency of usage and the designs of the room, choose a good quality sofa to invest in. Whatever sofa you choose, make sure that it is cleaned and maintained properly to increase its life and preserve its new look.
