Furniture Chests

Here’s something to keep in mind when looking for furniture chests of drawers. When people want furniture for a bedroom, often they will look for a matching set, where the bed’s headboard and footboard has the same look as the nightstands and dressers, especially for the master bedroom. In other bedrooms it’s usually not as important that everything match as a set. Lot’s of people might find a furniture chest they like and, as long as it doesn’t clash in a serious way, they will place it in a secondary bedroom.

When it comes to household things, like many couples, I, the man, tend to value function more than form, whereas my wife cares more for how things look. As for the dresser in our bedroom, my wife obviously chose it for how it looked. To be fair, she purchased the set when she was single (before we even met) and wouldn’t have known to evaluate it based on anything other than style. All I tend to worry about is that it works and how often I’ll have to repair it (truth is, I likely won’t even notice it until it breaks or fails to function as expected).

Thus, over the years I’ve discovered a few things about our furniture chest that bug me. One dresser is about three feet high and six feet wide. There are eight drawers in three rows. The top three drawers have nobs and the others have swinging handles. They’re actually pretty cool looking–with part wood and part metal. The problem is they are noisy. When I have to get up early for work I try to be silent so I don’t wake my wife, especially when she has been up during the night several times with a baby. So I do a good job pulling clothes and shoes quietly from the closet, but then go to get my socks from our furniture chest. If I grab the handle to open the drawer it’s noisy from the metal on metal. If I manage to open the draw by holding the outer edge, the handle clanks against the drawer. That early in the morning I’m still mostly asleep and by the time I remember the drawer is noisy it’s too late. It wakes up my wife. I’ve cursed at that piece of furniture more than once because of this.

The other thing I dislike is the lack of quality on the inside. It’s a solid piece of furniture that is obviously made of real wood, given how heavy it is. Yet while it looks nice and fancy, it seems they chinced on the insides, at the place where the thing gets the most use. I mean, “come on!” There’s only one moving part to the entire contraption: opening and closing the drawers. Yet they have a single, thin rod of wood for each drawer to slide in. Perhaps if we never moved, the drawers would all be in their same spots and would work fine. Needless to say, some of the tracks have broke and many of the drawers don’t slide smoothly anymore.

So here’s a tip, ladies: if the furniture chest you are buying is going in your bedroom or your husband is going to use it, check to see if the handles are noisy or if the drawers are noisy when opening/closing, and check how solid or flimsy the tracking rods are. Do the drawers glide on rollers, or slide metal against wood? Just remember, a broken chest of drawers will mar the beauty you are seeking. Hey, now that I think about it, it’s just like finding a good man. You need to look inside as well as on the outside. It won’t matter how good looking he is (or your furniture) if he is emotionally fragile and ends up breaking in a couple years.