Andover has more old furniture per square mile than it has any right to. Greek Revival houses up and down Route 4, antique dealers who’ve been here for decades, and family pieces that have never once left the parlor. Upholstery in this town tends to be older than the people sitting on it.
Take East Andover. The village center at Route 11 and Chase Hill Road went on the National Register in 1989 — a meetinghouse from 1796 that got turned to face south and dressed up Greek Revival in 1840, the Grange Hall that started life in 1850 as the Highland Lake Institute, a schoolhouse from 1903. The houses around it are of a piece. Inside them you find camelback sofas, wing chairs, side chairs stuffed with horsehair, and a lot of fabric that was put on in the 1950s and never replaced.
Then there are the antique shops. Andover has been known for them a long time. Somebody buys a good mahogany settee, gets it home, and realizes it smells exactly like the barn it came out of. Happens every summer.
Old furniture isn’t fragile across the board. Some of it is tougher than anything sold new. But you can’t clean it on autopilot.
Before you carry an antique-shop find into the house, set it on the porch for a sunny afternoon and look under the dust cover. If you see droppings or nesting, call an upholsterer first.
A 150-year-old chair doesn’t have a cleaning tag, and if it did, it wouldn’t describe the fabric somebody stapled on in 1962. So the first ten minutes go to finding out what we’re dealing with — burn test on a loose thread if needed, dye-bleed test on a hidden spot, a look at how the stuffing is holding up.
Cotton and linen brown if they’re over-wet. Silk and some rayon blends water-spot. Wool velvet is lovely and tolerant, as long as nobody scrubs the nap the wrong way. Horsehair and cotton batting hold water for a long time, so on old pieces we use low-moisture methods and air movers and let it dry from the inside out.
Sometimes the honest answer is that a piece needs an upholsterer, not a cleaner. When the fabric is shredding or the webbing’s gone, we’ll say so. You lose nothing but a phone call.
A standard sofa runs $90–$150, with chairs and loveseats coming in under that. A parlor set, a pair of wing chairs or a new antique-shop find all get one combined price before we start. Fabric protector is optional.
Usually, yes, if the fabric is sound. We identify the fiber, test for dye bleed and use the gentlest method that will actually lift the soil. Older stuffing like horsehair or cotton batting gets a low-moisture approach and careful drying. If a piece is too fragile, we will tell you before touching it.
Most of the time, yes, if the odor is in the cover and upper padding. We clean, treat for odor and dry thoroughly. If mice have nested in it or the stuffing is moldy, it needs to be opened up by an upholsterer, and we will say so plainly.
Yes. Wool is forgiving and cleans well with a pH-balanced product and controlled moisture. Velvet needs the nap brushed in its natural direction while drying, or it can look crushed. We see a lot of both in older Andover homes.
Most pieces are dry enough to sit on in four to six hours with good airflow. Older furniture with thick natural stuffing can take longer, and we will tell you before we leave. Keep pets and kids off it until it is fully dry.
Flexible scheduling, flat prices quoted up front, and a crew that knows the Lakes Region.
Tell us where the property is and what needs cleaning. We'll get right back to you with a straight, flat price.
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