Sofa & upholstered furniture manufacturing
Sofa Manufacturing for Retailers & Brands
Sofas developed and built to specification — frame, suspension, foam and cover — sampled before production and inspected before they ship.
Start from a sofa Furniship has already developed, or bring your own design. Programmes run from entry-level to very premium, and the same upholstery capability covers armchairs, lounge chairs and upholstered beds.
- Frame
- Timber & engineered
- Suspension
- Webbing & serpentine
- Fill
- Foam & fibre
- Cover
- Fabric & leather
- Format
- Fixed & modular
Sofa formats Furniship builds.
Two seat
Apartment ranges and smaller footprints, and the second piece in a set.
Three seat
The volume line in almost every retail assortment.
Four seat & large
Where the room allows it, and where perceived value is highest.
Corner
One piece covering the living room, left- or right-hand facing.
Modular
Units that combine, so one product line covers several room sizes.
Chaise & compact
Love seats, chaise ends and the pieces that finish a configuration.
From compact two-seaters to large modular and corner configurations, format is defined around the buyer's assortment and specification.
What publishes here per model
Individual models publish here once Furniship's product library and photography are in place. Nothing is listed until it is real.
- Model name
- Format & seat count
- Overall dimensions
- Seat height & depth
- Frame construction
- Suspension type
- Foam & cushion build
- Cover options
- Packing & cube
The same upholstery capability covers armchairs, lounge chairs and upholstered bed frames.
Armchairs & lounge chairsFive layers. Four of them are invisible in a photograph.
- 01
Frame
The structure everything else is attached to, and the only layer that cannot be corrected after production.
- What varies
- Timber species and grade, engineered panel, corner blocking, joint method
- What it costs to get wrong
- Creaking, racking and warranty returns that appear after the first season
- 02
Suspension
What sits between the frame and the seat, and what most of the seat feel actually comes from.
- What varies
- Elastic webbing, serpentine springs, spring count and gauge
- What it costs to get wrong
- Sag in the seat that no amount of foam density can disguise
- 03
Fill
Foam and fibre, layered. Comfort, recovery and how the piece looks after it has been sat in.
- What varies
- Foam density and grade, layer build-up, fibre wrap, feather or fibre cushions
- What it costs to get wrong
- Cushions that flatten, and a silhouette that stops matching the sample
- 04
Cover
The only layer the customer touches, and the one that carries the product's perceived quality.
- What varies
- Fabric or leather, weave and rub count, seam construction, piping, fixed or loose covers
- What it costs to get wrong
- Pilling, seam pull and colour variation between production runs
- 05
Format
How the piece is configured, and how it gets into a room and onto a container.
- What varies
- Fixed, modular or corner, arm style, leg fixing, knock-down assembly
- What it costs to get wrong
- A sofa that cannot clear a stairwell, or fills a container at half its value
Adjustable per programme.
Start from a Furniship sofa
Take a developed format and adapt it for your market — cover, fill, dimensions, arm, leg, construction, packaging and branding. The frame already exists, so fewer decisions have to start from nothing.
Private label & ODM furnitureStart from your own design
Send a design, a specification or a reference sofa. Furniship engineers it for production and manufactures to the approved standard. Everything is open, including the frame.
OEM furniture manufacturing
Not resolved yet — an idea, a dimension, a fabric direction?
Custom furniture manufacturing- Cover — fabric, leather, colourFrom a Furniship designSet by youFrom your designSet by you
- Fill — foam grade, cushion buildFrom a Furniship designSet by youFrom your designSet by you
- Legs, feet and finishFrom a Furniship designSet by youFrom your designSet by you
- Dimensions — width, depth, heightFrom a Furniship designAlready resolvedFrom your designSet by you
- Arm and back profileFrom a Furniship designAlready resolvedFrom your designSet by you
- Format — fixed, modular, cornerFrom a Furniship designAlready resolvedFrom your designSet by you
- Frame constructionFrom a Furniship designAlready resolvedFrom your designSet by you
- Packaging, labelling and brandingFrom a Furniship designSet by youFrom your designSet by you
"Already resolved" means the Furniship design has settled it, so the programme can run without revisiting it — not that it is fixed. Anything on this list can be adapted on either route. The difference is how much has to be decided before a sample can be made.
04Development
Comfort is not a specification. It is a decision made sitting down.
Seat height, depth, pitch and foam build can all be correct on paper and wrong in the room. On upholstery programmes the sample is not a formality — it is where these decisions are resolved together. A sofa programme brings structure, comfort, upholstery, format and packing decisions together in one product.
- Seat depth & height
- Judged against the market the sofa is going to, not against the drawing.
- Firmness & recovery
- How the seat feels on the first sit, and how it looks after an hour.
- Back pitch & support
- Where the back lands, and whether the cushion holds its shape.
- Arm height & scale
- How the piece reads in a room rather than in a specification sheet.
- Specification level
- Programmes run from entry-level to very premium. Comfort requirements and construction are agreed as part of the quotation and order process, per programme — there is no single house standard every sofa is built to.
- First prototype
- On sofa programmes, a first physical prototype will typically take around 15–30 days, depending on the product and construction. It can be reviewed at source or shipped to the customer for evaluation.
A sofa is built through distinct production stages.
- 01
Frame assembly
Timber is cut, jointed, blocked and assembled. Nothing after this stage can correct the frame, which is why it carries the least tolerance in the whole build.
Checked at this stageSquareness, joint integrity, moisture content of the timber
- 02
Suspension & base
Webbing or serpentine springs are fitted and tensioned to the approved sample. Tension is a setting rather than a material, which is why it can move between runs.
Checked at this stageSpring count and gauge, webbing tension, fixing method
- 03
Foam & cushions
Foam is cut and laminated to the approved build-up, fibre wrapped, and cushions filled. The layer order matters as much as the grades in it.
Checked at this stageFoam grade and density against specification, layer sequence, cushion weight
- 04
Cutting & sewing
Cover material is nested, cut and sewn. Pattern direction, seam type and piping are set at this stage and cannot be adjusted later.
Checked at this stageBatch colour against the approved sample, cut direction, seam and stitch density
- 05
Upholstering & finishing
The cover is fitted to the frame, tensioned and finished, and legs are fitted before the piece is packed.
Checked at this stageCover tension and alignment, symmetry, gaps, finished dimensions against the sample
Full QC programme
Where the customer asks for it, Furniship takes full responsibility for the quality-control programme on a sofa order.
Furniship is responsible toward the customer for resolving non-conformity against the agreed specification and QC standard.
Relevant third-party testing can be arranged through external laboratories where the customer's market requires it.
- Incoming materials and components
- In-line production checks
- Dimensions and construction
- Appearance and finish
- Upholstery and seams
- Comfort and function where applicable
- Packaging
- Labels and markings
- Final pre-shipment inspection
- Photographic and documentary reporting
Production is held against the approved sample rather than against a drawing, and the sample is retained for reorders.
Furniture quality control06Where sofas are made
Upholstery is difficult to evaluate at distance because comfort, construction, cover execution and finish are only partly visible in photographs and specifications.
Furniship combines owned manufacturing with a wider partner-factory network in Asia, including China, and matches each sofa programme to a setup built for upholstery rather than to whichever line is free. Three things make a sofa specifically harder than a case-goods programme.
Comfort needs to be validated physically
A drawing settles dimensions. It does not settle how a seat feels, so the assessment happens on a physical sample — on every programme, not only the first.
Fabric batches and upholstery execution can introduce variation between runs
Cover material is confirmed against the approved sample before each run, because both the batch and the way it is cut and sewn affect how consistent the finished piece is.
Upholstered furniture is highly volume-sensitive in transport
Cubic volume, not weight, decides what a sofa programme costs to move, which makes packing decisions part of the product rather than part of the logistics.
How a partner factory is matched, what is inspected, and what to ask any manufacturing partner in China.
Furniture manufacturing in China07Cube & transit
A sofa is mostly air, and you pay to ship it.
Decisions taken during development decide how much of a container the programme wastes. They are commercial decisions, not logistics ones, which is why they are taken while the product still can be changed.
Knock-down where it earns its place
Removable legs, split backs and modular units can change container fill materially. They also add assembly at the customer's end — a trade, not a free win.
Cushion compression
How cushions are packed affects both cube and how the sofa looks when the carton is opened. Recovery time is part of the specification.
Corner and edge protection
Upholstery damages in transit differently from case goods. Protection is engineered to the piece, not applied generically.
08Buyer questions
What sofa buyers ask
- Can you build to our own frame and foam specification?
- Yes. A written specification for frame construction, suspension, foam grade and cover is exactly what an OEM sofa programme runs from, and production is inspected against the approved sample it produces.
- Do you manufacture sofas in China?
- Yes. Furniship owns manufacturing operations and also works with partner factories in Asia, including China, and matches each sofa programme to a setup built for upholstery. Standards including FSC®, ISO 9001 and BSCI are required of partner factories.
- Do you make upholstered furniture other than sofas?
- Yes. The same upholstery capability covers armchairs, lounge chairs and upholstered bed frames, and those run as the same kind of programme.
- How is comfort agreed before production?
- On a physical sample. Seat height, depth, pitch and firmness are assessed and corrected on the piece itself, and the approved sample becomes the standard production is held to. The comfort and construction level itself is agreed as part of the quotation and order process — programmes run from entry-level to very premium, and there is no single standard applied to all of them.
- How are covers matched across production runs?
- Cover material is confirmed against the approved sample before each run, and inspection covers colour and construction consistency as well as defects.
- What durability testing is carried out?
- Relevant third-party testing is arranged through external laboratories where the destination market requires it. Which tests apply is agreed per programme and per market rather than fixed in advance, and no test standard is claimed here that has not been agreed for a specific order.
- What is the minimum order quantity for a sofa programme?
- MOQs are set around the product and programme rather than one fixed threshold. They vary with construction, materials and the requirements of the programme itself.
- How long does a first prototype take?
- On sofa programmes, typically around 15–30 days, depending on the product and construction. The prototype can be reviewed at source or shipped to the customer for evaluation. Timing for other categories depends on the product, construction and programme.
Send us a sofa. Or a drawing of one.
Enough to work out whether the programme is buildable and what it costs:
- The format your assortment is missing
- A reference piece, a drawing or a specification — whichever exists
- A cover direction, and the market it is selling into
- A target retail or landed price
A reference photograph and a price point are enough to start. The rest is what development is for.
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