How Much You Know about The Structure And Materials of The Modern Design Sofa

The origin of the sofa can be traced back to ancient Egypt around 2000 BC, but the real upholstered sofa appeared from the end of the 16th century to the beginning of the 17th century. At that time, the sofa was mainly filled with natural elastic materials such as horsehair, poultry feather, and plant fluff. Its cover was stitched with fabrics such as velvet and embroidery to form a soft human contact surface. After hundreds of years of development, the sofa has now become a must-have for the home. If you want to buy a comfortable modern design sofa, it is very important to understand the structure and materials of the modern design sofa. The composition of a modern sofa is composed of a main frame, a seating structure, external fabrics and fillers.

1.The main frame of modern design sofa

​At present, there are mainly three main frames of sofas on the market:

A. Solid wood structure

​Due to the shortage of wood resources, the drying technology, tenon and mortise connection of hard miscellaneous wood are technically difficult. In addition, modern sofas with real solid wood structure are quite expensive, and modern sofas of this type of structure are quite rare. Therefore, this type of sofa has the characteristics of high value, good environmental protection, and long service life.

B. Panel-wood structure

​A structural skeleton made of wooden beams and upright supports combined with multi-layer composite boards by nailing. This kind of structural material has the characteristics of low cost, simple manufacturing process, easy molding and high manufacturing efficiency, and is currently a process structure widely used in the production of modern sofas. However, the high formaldehyde content of multi-layer composite panels is easy to cause pollution and emit peculiar smell.

2.Sitting surface structure of modern design sofa

The sitting surface is the main part of modern sofas that are stressed, and it is also a key part of the comfort and service life of modern design sofas. The sitting surface structure of modern sofas mainly includes rubber bandages (good elasticity but short service life, easy to collapse), wooden flat plates (inelastic, poor sitting feeling but long service life), snake-shaped steel springs (good elasticity, good sitting feeling, long lasting).

​The sitting surface is the main part of modern sofas that are stressed, and it is also a key part of the comfort and service life of modern design sofas. The sitting surface structure of modern sofas mainly includes rubber bandages (good elasticity but short service life, easy to collapse), wooden flat plates (inelastic, poor sitting feeling but long service life), snake-shaped steel springs (good elasticity, good sitting feeling, long lasting).

3. Leather and fabric of modern design sofa

​Leather is divided into genuine leather and PU leather. Genuine leather is divided into yellow leather and buffalo leather. If it is classified according to the number of layers, it can be divided into first layer leather, second layer leather, and three layer leather. According to the origin, it is divided into domestic leather and imported leather. The imported leather is made of yellow leather with the best quality, environmental protection, high color fastness, good elasticity and air permeability, high mechanical strength, especially high tear strength and tensile strength.

​The density of fabric fabrics is related to the long-term mechanical wear life of modern sofas, so the fabrics of modern sofas should be relatively thick. The density of China's standard sofa fabrics is greater than 300G/M2, and it must be ensured that the surface can not be balled after 12,000 times of friction. At present, most modern sofa manufacturers in China use blended fabrics or chemical fiber fabrics. Pure cotton fabrics (shrinkage, durability, resilience) are still difficult to use on the surface of the sofa.

4.Fillers for modern design sofas

There are three main types of fillers for modern sofas:
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Soft polyurethane foam (commonly known as sponge): The sponges used for sofa filling are mainly divided into three categories. Conventional sponges are sponges produced mainly by conventional polyether and TDI. It is characterized by good resilience, softness and air permeability; high resilience sponge is a kind of sponge produced by active polyphosphorus and TDI as the main body. It has excellent mechanical properties, good elasticity, and large compressive load. Flame resistance, good air permeability; chaotic pore sponge is a kind of sponge similar to natural seaweed with different inner pores. It is characterized by good elasticity and excellent cushioning when compressed and rebounded.

Down filling: Down is used as the filling for modern sofas. It has a comfortable sitting feeling and small deformation after long-term use. The disadvantage is slow rebound and high cost. Generally used in combination with sponge in high-end sofas, or suitable for use as a cushion.
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Artificial cotton filling: Artificial cotton is used as sofa filling, which has excellent softness and comfortable sitting feeling, but it has poor mechanical properties and small compression load. It is only suitable for cushions.

The key points of choosing the filling material of modern sofa: According to the different types of filling material, the sofa will be very different in use.
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Generally speaking, the cushion padding of fabric sofas on the market should use high resilience sponge of more than 30 kg/m3. Most of them use a whole piece of sponge filling method. The best form is 30 kg/m3. The superimposed combination of high resilience sponges and porous sponges with down or artificial cotton over meters increases comfort and service life. When choosing, you should ask about the type of filling. If the filling is a sponge, you should know the density of the sponge used, feel the rebound effect of the cushion by gravity, and feel the comfort of sitting. Generally, sponge cushions are used. Its national standard is 25KG/M3 and the international standard is 35KG/M3. Its bottom structure adopts high elasticity snake spring structure better than bandage structure, high-quality bandage is better than inferior one.

The composition of a sofa is inseparable from the four main bodies of frame, sitting surface structure, exterior fabric and filler. As long as you master these four main structures for making a modern sofa, you can clearly distinguish and judge the quality of the sofa. 

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