# Tailor Furniture vs Non Tailor Furniture in HK



## JLui (Aug 18, 2016)

Hi, I am thinking about moving to HK from the USA, and visited some relatives there recently. 

I know that HK apartments are much much smaller than housing in the USA, and I'm thinking I may need to refurnish when I move - so I went to look at the furniture stores in Horizon plaza in Ap Lei Chau. Which apparently is the Furniture hotspot in HK.

I'm awful at window shopping, and will nearly always go in and chat with the shopkeeper for 30+ mins. So I only hit 4 stores in the entire building before I had to leave. 

One thing I noticed was that of the 4 stores I visited, 2 are Custom made/Tailor made furniture (Joineur Family store and CAZ1102). In the US, my family rarely bought tailor furniture, and usually tailor furniture is much much more expensive. 

The other two stores were Indigo and Tequila Cola(?) and were really similar to Marshalls in the US. Their furniture was really large and I'm afraid that they'll be way too big for a standard apartment in HK.

I'm pretty sure Joineur's was only for the super-rich, as they specialized in really fancy woods and whatnot. The shopkeeper was showing me a chair made of 300+ year old black ebony with an extravagant pricetag. Personally I was suprised that anyone let him cut down a 300+ year old tree. In CA you'd be crucified by the Liberals if you touched a tree like that 

Caz1102 was about half the price of Joineur's and didn't sell fancy wood etc... They seemed alot more compact and space saving than the 'Marshalls'' lookalikes. They're showroom pieces were very nice and pricings were very reasonable (like 70 USD for an unmodified chair), but they said they would charge more if I wanted to modify the piece. They didn't tell me exactly how much more they would charge though. 

So my question is: Is tailor made furniture a common thing in Hong kong? Meaning, do many people buy custom furniture? Because of the small living space, is Custom furniture actually a good investment? In your experience, how much was the modification cost? 

I currently live in SoCAL, where theres no moisture whatsoever. So my furniture will pretty much last forever, but in HK i Imagine that the moisture can really effect furniture's longevity. Do you find that Tailor Furniture lasts longer than Set pieces? 

Finally, since I only visited a few stores before I left, is CAZ1102 a good standard for Tailor Furniture? or is Joineur's closer to the standard. Do only really rich people buy Tailor furniture? Or, are the prices of tailor similar to set pieces - as CAZ said. 

Sorry for the Long post. And thanks for any help in advance


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## HK2015 (Sep 30, 2014)

I find the custom option to be more common in Hong Kong the prices are relatively more expensive but more affordable that what you would find in the states.

For the main furniture items such as beds, it worth getting a pre existing design seeing as mattresses come in set dimensions. With sofas retails can be flexible on the dimensions and can make a sofa to fit your living room. 

You'll have a lot of existing designs to select from and anything you cant find then go for the custom option. 

Check out DSL Furniture, I've used them 4 times they have been very helpful. They will be able to offer you some more specific advice.
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