Not sure if it still holds true, but my Swedish relative told me years ago that the annual Ikea catalog is the single biggest print job in the world.

We are redoing our guest room and putting in the IKEA Hemmes line. The room won't get a ton of use so we figured that IKEA was good for that.

Anonymous wrote:I've had a coffee table, a night stand and some unfinished shelves for almost 20 years. Their wood used to be better. They used to sell a lot unfinished, and the showroom was all about the funky paint jobs you could do.

Agreed. I still have a number of very solid pieces that I bought 25 years ago. These days I buy the storage shelving units that look like a lot of cubes, and basic desks for the kids. They're not solid wood, though they seem pretty sturdy. I like the lamps. We also bought a foam mattress there last year that we like. Overall it's a good deal for the quality. They're not heirlooms or anything.

I prefer the Woodbridge IKEA, and like others, only buy the hardwood furniture these days. We do buy housewares there and the knobs for cabinets are very affordable, if you want to change up a space.

My impression is that IKEA is so cheap because it is so global. In fact IKEA products and, maybe, Coca-Cola are the things you see ABSOLUTELY everywhere, so it's kind of a "global Walmart". (and it is actually quite comforting - when we were visiting some friends and relatives far-far away for a couple of weeks when my son was 3, they asked if he needed anything special - we asked if they could get a little plastic stepstool from IKEA for the bathroom sink, and lo and behold when we arrived he had the same stepstool he has at home waiting for him on the opposite side of the world

For me when it comes to furniture IKEA is great for many kid's things (unless of course you plan on having a lot of kids and need your furniture to last decades), and that is the only particleboard furniture from IKEA that we have - since we really need it for very short time after all.
We do have a lot of their solid wood pieces, though (just counted 7 different HEMNES - no complaints so far , several things for the bathrooms, and various smaller decorative pieces (lamps, mirrors, rugs, etc.) that easy to replace once you are tired of them (yes, great prices).

In general the same rule applies to IKEA things as to anything else: their more expensive things (and they do have quite expensive pieces of furniture, relatively speaking, of course) are MUCH better that the cheap ones. I'm always annoyed when a person goes to ikea and buys $30 bookcases and then complains everywhere that IKEA only sells crap: dude, why didn't you buy Stockholm bookcase in the first place then?

One thing about local IKEA stores: avoid Greenbelt IKEA on the weekends, especially on the "eat for free" weekends AT ALL COSTS! It is a "United Nations" type of Zoo: literally people from every country in the world, and it is definitely not for the faint of heart. If you need to go to Greenbelt IKEA go on the weekdays, or better yet go to Woodbridge or Baltimore ones (although, they are smaller and don't have everything, but you can always check online the stock availability beforehand).

Anonymous wrote:The wood is harvested from Chernobyl. It is super cheap b/c it is readioactive.

Hasn't that been debunker?

I bought a lot of it when I was in college, and in my first apartment. It worked for me at the time. When I bought my first "big girl" house, I started buying furniture from more traditional furniture stores...which is more my taste anyway. I do have an Expidet (sp?) in the basement, and I love it!!

I've had a coffee table, a night stand and some unfinished shelves for almost 20 years. Their wood used to be better. They used to sell a lot unfinished, and the showroom was all about the funky paint jobs you could do.

Agree that you get what you pay for. I like a lot of the styles, though. I've used some of their modular pine shelving in various rooms for 20 years now, and I just repainted it and added some pieces to make yet another set of shelves.

I love IKEA. It's great for people who like to change their decor often. I like antiques, too - but sometimes I feel like I'm "stuck" with them just because they belonged to some relative years ago. iKEA is cheap enough that I feel I can change things up without breaking the bank.

It's no different in quality than most of the veneered mid-range places: West Elm, CB2, Crate and Barrel, etc. We have modern tastes, so we use a lot of ikea in our house. Some stuff holds up very well, many years later. Some of the stuff is just a step above cardboard. I'm more skeptical of their upholstered stuff. But glass, metal, lacquer and some of the wood stuff - you're not going to beat it.

I love their cheap breakfasts...Or the ones they used to have a few years back. (Haven't been there for a few years.)

I used to get a plate of eggs, bacon/sausage and toast for a few bucks while my kids got to play in a play area with toys and watch cartoons on a T.V. set while I ate.

Win win.

Anonymous wrote:OP here, so IKEA is generally okay. There is no catch?

The catch is that you get what you pay for. If you buy one of their $200 couches, don't expect it to hold up for very long. But if you spend $1000 on a couch, it will last.

off-gassing formaldehyde

Smell. Can't stand the smell of their kitchen showrooms.

Otherwise I would consider it.

We currently have in our new baby's room an IKEA dresser that is 24(?) years old. I'm not kidding. We got it for my room when I was a teenager and it has now made it's way from de to sc (my parents had it in their beach property) to Richmond (their new home there) to nova.

It still looks pretty good. And it works just as it always did.

So it can last if it isn't treated poorly.

I have a dresser that I got 15 years ago to use as a tv stand that has had multiple uses over the years in 4 different houses. I love that damn thing. My husband keeps trying to get rid of it, but it is so ridiculously versatile that he always seems to find somewhere new to put it. So, it has been a tv stand, a foyer table, a buffet and is now storage furniture in our den. I think it's next life will probably be another dresser in one of the girl's bedrooms.