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So I was at my professor’s pad the other week and he’s a very cool guy. It wasn’t fully furnished yet, but it seems that I’ll want to spend a lot of time there, once everything’s fixed up. A couple suave genuine leather couches adds a whole lot of class to the relatively minimalist scheme. For a professor in Art History, he likes the new stuff better than the old. (Ironically, I was interviewing him about ancient art for my undergrad thesis.)
Call it tacky or cruel if you may (because they come from cows), genuine leather furniture is an art form when properly made. It’s sleek and shiny, it can come in many textures and styles, and it can last for a very, very long time. In the past, having quality leather resulted from a tedious and very poisonous process of cleaning, drying, tanning and often, engraving it with very fine details.
With a lot of things, from sunlight, humidity, treatment and whatnot, that should be considered with genuine leather furniture, a lot of people don’t like it because it needs maintenance. But then again, I say, so does a Ferrari.
When I think about it, leather furniture is a sports car in the world furniture. It’s classy, expensive and gives a sense of power with its sheer beauty, even if it is just a couch. My professor’s couches, for example, came from retired bulls from some place he refuses to tell me where. But what I did find out was he made it with his own hands in a friend’s work shop. The leather was expensive but because he actually made the whole thing, it was priceless.
It looks awesome in itself but it’s even better because it works well with the rest of the apartment’s interiors. Along with the sexy African jars that he had, and the post-modern sculptures he made himself from adobe, the room was exquisite. This was in spite of the fact that there were still boxes lying around.
But as much as good leather is made into a beautiful piece of furniture, there are times that it doesn’t work. It CAN look tacky if you don’t pair it with up with the proper aesthetic sense in designing a room. Leather furniture should work with the space and dimensions of a room, not make it stick out like an expensive sore thumb in a shabby environment.
When I left the pad, I hoped that one day I’ll get to make my own leather couch. Guess I’ll have to kill a cow first.
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