Skirts - Doing many in your business?

[baileyuph]

What is working best for you?

Meaning.....do you add stiffener and line or?

I don't see skirts applied to newer furniture as we did in traditional work, do you?

They can get labor intensive, I have noted factories has developed faster techniques to get around this problem.

I might be old school, a nice traditional skirt, lined, stiffened and even the corner flaps lined sure can add a touch to furniture upholstery work.

Almost forgot, do you sew the cording to the skirt and then slip it on the piece of furniture and then staple it to the frame.  There are many ways to handle this issue, some do not sew up a finished skirt assembly and then take it to the furniture for stapeling to the frame, while some do not sew the skirt pieces to a cording at all, instead they staple the welt, the panels, and corner pieces to the frame all in that sequence.  I see manufacturers do it that way.

Our industry is so labor intensive, I can understand some cutting out steps.

Doyle

[sofadoc]

Our industry is so labor intensive, I can understand some cutting out steps

One time saving step that I like to use (especially with COM) is to fold a skirt panel in half, and sew it on the ends.

Example: Say I need a skirt panel to finish 6"H X 24"W. I cut a panel 13"H X 25"W, fold and sew on each end. I then insert stiffener inside, and then sew all the panels to the welt.

I call it "doubling" the skirt. It saves a lot of time not having to sew a separate backing/lining on the skirt panels. I try to cut time off COM jobs, since I'm not making any money on material.

To me, stapling the panels separately only saves time if you have some tricky pattern matching to do. 

[baileyuph]

That reduces the requirement a great amount.

Then, do you steam press before installation or ?

[kodydog]

I'm not sure there is a right or wrong way to apply skirts as long as the end result is a neat, even and flat skirt. I've seen some really bad looking skirts on new furniture and newly upholstered furniture that makes the whole job look bad.

I use the stiff liner with stiffner inserts on all my skirts. I steam the skirt first, I staple the welt to the frame then apply the skirt. 1/2" cardboard strips are a nice touch. I've learned over the years not to cardboard the blocks but just staple them on tightly against the cord. Finish off with more steam especially on the end of each skirt where all the fabric build up is.

I'd think a nice exposed caberal type leg looks better than a skirt. I think manufactures started using skirts back when labor was cheep and finely hand carved legs were expensive.