Price for two cushions of approx 6 ft?

[Dick Barthel]

Would anyone have any idea what a reasonable price range might be to have two approximate 6' settee cushions done with a good 4" pad and with a nice sunbrella fabric by a decent canvas shop? The zipper is on the bottom and the bottom has some mesh material so the pad can breath. I assume most of the cost would be for labor?

I got a price the other day and it sounded ridiculously high. I'll disclose the quoted price at the end if I get any responses. I better learn how to sew is my thought.

Thanks

Dick

[Ocean Girl]

I just purchased two pieces of 4 inch x 6ft foam for 130.00 (free shipping -from foamfactory.com) and bought 12 yards pf sunbrella for 220.00 (inc shipping and thread -from outdoorfabrics.com).
My mom and I are doing the sewing but I have a friend who owns a canvas shop and he charges about 60 bucks for the labor of one basic cushion.
Hope that helps,
Erika

[Warren Kaplan]

Dunno if this will help but I just got an estimate for two 6' settee cushions, two vee berth cushions (each about 6' also) and an insert between the vee berth cushions, covered with good quality sunbrella. The material to be used was very good quality 4" high density foam. This for a CD27.

Now, realize that I am in the very expensive NYC area and quite frankly alot of the cushions shops that used to be around here are just plain gone due to the recession.

Anyway, the quote for the work was $2000. Steep in my view, to be sure, but I'm having a hard time finding anyone reputable to give me another quote. This guy does excellent work. By the way, I asked him how much more it would be for 6" foam instead of 4" foam (these old bones need the padding) and he said for 6" foam the job would be $2500.

So....here's a benchmark to use in your considerations.

[moctrams]

Ordered new main salon cushions at the Annapolis boat show from:

Island Nautical dba JSI
2233 3rd Ave S.
St. Petersburg, FL 33712
727-577-3220
727-577-6816 FAX

Toatl cost was $1590. They sent me the instructions and paper to measure for the cushions and I FEDEXd the lot back to them. This company makes the cushions that go in the Catalina sailboats. I looked at their work while at the boat show and they do very good work.

[SurryMark]

Two cushions for my 27, with the expensive foam that doesn't stay dented where you always sit, a high quality Sunbrella fabric, mesh bottom, and totally A-1 workmanship costs something under $900 from Harmon Upholstery in Ellsworth, ME. Wayne Harmon is a one-man shop, who does a lot of boat work.

[mahalocd36]

Well it is fairly labor intensive but you have to consider the price of materials as well. Foam is expensive.

We just got the foam (5") and materials to do Mahalo's interior cushions ourselves, except the V-berth. That is: the 2 sette's (one's an L), including back cushions, and the quarterberth. Our winter project. From sailrite, the cost for fabric, zippers, mesh material for the bottom, batting (for softer edges) etc, came to $485 (I'm leaving off shipping which was a $50, we got naugasoft,which is really heavy. It's about the same price as sunbrella/yard). Figures, a week after I ordered sailrite ran a free shipping special

Then, the foam cost us another few hundred bucks (Rich knows the price but he's not home right now). Presumably a huge shop could get stuff for better prices but a one man shop probably not.

So far, we just have the foam cut. That took a few hours mainly to measure many times so we didn't screw up the expensive foam

Anyways, I'd be curious to see what a shop would charge for this. I wouldn't expect less than 2-3k. For us, we are following the old cushions, it is 8 cushions as the L-berth accounts for 5 of them.

[Duncan]

1. Oceangirl's quote is the only one that seemed halfway reasonable to me. This is not exactly rocket science, and I would think that foam and fabric are basically commodities.
It's not like other areas of marine supplies, where you are dealing with small volumes, specialized materials and specific expertise.

There's a very large, efficient upholstered furniture market out there: I would think this means that getting some cushions shouldn't be a complicated or expensive proposition. This should be quite a bit less expensive than , e.g. a couch or an armchair, either of which involve more materials and labor than a simple block cushion?

2. Why would one use Sunbrella, which is an outdooor fabric, whose major virtue is UV resistance? I would imagine that good quality, heavy duty upholstery material would be more suitable and quite a bit less expensive?

[Tod Mills]

If you do decide to sew them yourself or if you want to supply the fabric for them, here is a recommendation from a guy on another board who's opinion I trust:

Fabric for cushions: I'd like to pass along an incredible company with

my heartiest recommendations as a terrific outfit to do business

with, and to save yourself a fortune.

Samuel Harris, Ltd, 182 Front St. E., Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5A 1E6, phone 416.362.1964.

This outfit does NOT reupholster cushions. They are a reseller of

upholstery fabric at impossibly inexpensive prices. They purchase

surplus and discontinued fabric from automobile manufacturers and marine

manufacturers. Our cushions are now covered in a tan velour originally

from General Motors. The fabric, INCLUDING shipping, cost us less than

$7.00 a yard.

You phone the firm, tell them the color range(s) and fabric types you're

interested in, and they send you dozens of samples to choose from.

Outstanding.

(I saw pics of his cushions and they looked GREAT)

This was from a few years ago; I'm assuming the company is still around in these turbulent economic times...

Tod

[Dick Barthel]

12. Why would one use Sunbrella, which is an outdooor fabric, whose major virtue is UV resistance? I would imagine that good quality, heavy duty upholstery material would be more suitable and quite a bit less expensive?

Sunbrella has a full line of fabric for cushions that are very different than their materials for dodgers, sail covers, etc.

[bottomscraper]

Foam is expensive.

Then, the foam cost us another few hundred bucks (Rich knows the price but he's not home right now)

Foam was about $560 (free shipping).. We also ordered from The Foam Factory aka Foam by Mail. That was for all of the interior cushions on a CD36 not counting the vberth. Priced the foam locally also but it was significantly more partially because the sheet sizes were different and didn't work out as well.

http://www.thefoamfactory.com

[mahalocd36]

2. Why would one use Sunbrella, which is an outdooor fabric, whose major virtue is UV resistance? I would imagine that good quality, heavy duty upholstery material would be more suitable and quite a bit less expensive?

Sunbrella does make interior grade stuff, plus, being on a boat you want to make sure it's mildew/mold resistant, sunbrella is not the only choice but certainly a fine one.

Also, given the bevel of the cushions against the hull, and the 'customness' of this, I can see, unless you are making 100 catalina 42's, that this is a 'custom' job......

[SurryMark]

So Dick, when will you share the quote you got? Was it less than any of the prices given here for two finished cusions?

[Dick Barthel]

Based on the responses my quote of $1750 bears continuing my search or getting an air mattress to go under the old! Thanks for all the great information. Taking in all of the responses it would seem my upper range of a fair price might be $1000.

Thanks again,

Dick

[John Laton]

Although I still have a wonderful CD10 I could not pass up on a once in a lifetime deal for a ugh..1989 Catalina 27 .. problem was the cushions were pretty tired.. All 10 from Catalina direct w/foam was $2200 plus additional truck shipping from CA.. done with all new foam. Since the foam was still very good I opted to have a local shop make new covers with marine grade vinyl bottoms/zippers and chose a medium weight Crypton fabric for the more couch-like feel yet have all the wear/mildew proof qualities of the Sunbrella fabrics. I ordered a bunch of sunbrella samples but was not overly impressed as even the interior ribbed softer grade sunbrella seemed a bit thin and stiff and was $18 a yard. Since I was paying $1200 for labor I went the extra $7 a yard that the Crypton fabric cost. ( JoAnns fabrics had a 50 % off sale on the $49.95 a yard Crypton). so 1200 labor 400 fabric and $150 vinyl brought me to 1750.00 + tax and got to have some great fabric in the end..

Good luck.. and I found doing this cushion thing took more time and aggravation then stripping my bottom.. and I was just ordering things !

Good luck !

John
CD10

[DaveCD28]

I'm in the process of recovering my old cabin cushions and backs. I bought the covering material (not outdoor, but water resistant) at Jo-Ann Fabrics (it's a chain, so maybe they have stores in your area) .

Jo Ann's was having a 50% off sale and it was already on clearance, so I got the stuff for $13.00 (5 yards x 5 feet wide) That should be enough to do it. (price after discount was ~ $2.50/yard)

I am re-using my old foam. I also bought vinyl for the bottoms, which came to $20. So ~$33 total for the material.

I am going to try to sew it. I've sewn sails, but never cushions.... but for $33 I can re-do it a few times before I get concerned. Sewing would probably be a good cruising skill to have, even though it's not too macho.

-David C
Cape Dory 28, Alaina