Crate & Barrel FINALLY coming to Pittsburgh! (furniture, what does)

[Jukesgrrl]

Originally Posted by Gnutella

IKEA's been in Pittsburgh since 1989, longer than it's been in Chicago, or any other U.S. city not named Philadelphia, Washington DC or Baltimore, for that matter.

I was just going to note that fact when I saw your post. If IKEA was going to have a major impact on the decor of Pittsburgh, it would have happened by now. Contemporary styles don't catch on in the 'burgh until they become retro.

[neurodistortion]

Originally Posted by nuwaver88

There are no I Hops in Pittsburgh either. This is no big loss as their are other places to get a good breakfast like Eat N' Park and Kings and many independent places. It just seems like I see them everywhere else.

There's one near the Mall at Robinson, and I believe there's also one down in Uniontown. Another one's also being built near the Waterfront.

[Craziaskowboi]

Originally Posted by Jukesgrrl

I was just going to note that fact when I saw your post. If IKEA was going to have a major impact on the decor of Pittsburgh, it would have happened by now. Contemporary styles don't catch on in the 'burgh until they become retro.

I don't believe that to be true, necessarily. IKEA has been profitable enough to last for 20 years in Pittsburgh. Somebody's buying the stuff.

[greg42]

Originally Posted by Gnutella

I don't believe that to be true, necessarily. IKEA has been profitable enough to last for 20 years in Pittsburgh. Somebody's buying the stuff.

Although Ikea does sell full kitchens, the one store alone is not enough to have everyone suddenly renovating their houses. I wouldn't say it has a major effect on the decor of Pittsburgh. Indeed, because Ikea has been here so long I've been able to watch it evolve. You know they originally sold European size mattresses, so the only sheets that really fit properly were the ones that came from Ikea. They ditched that eventually, and many other things ultimately became more tailored to American tastes as they expanded more in the US and remained committed for the long haul. They still have a lot of Euro style, sure, but there's a wider variety of styles in there than you might think.

Ikea stores also draw from a wide area. Look for all the Ohio tags in the parking lot. There is now a store open near Cincinnati, but that is fairly recent. Before that, Pittsburgh was the closest for most of Ohio and still is for the eastern half of the state, as well as western MD, WV, etc. This sounds crazy to some but there's a market out there for people who will drive a few hours to that store. Not that there isn't a reasonable local market, sure, but it's not all coming from Pittsburgh, and people here who do buy aren't necessarily filling their houses with it. (Mine has a fair bit of Ikea stuff, though.)

[BrianTH]

When I was a Pitt grad student, Ikea was a popular choice among my peers. We went their recently for some stuff for a playroom, and there were clearly still a lot of young adults buying stuff.

Which is my roundabout way of suggesting you could probably cater to that market without having a noticeable impact on other markets.

Oh, and I agree Crate & Barrel has its niche, but to me it is just another variation on the same theme as the aforementioned stores. Which is fine, but I'm not popping corks over it either.

[Tallysmom]

Regarding Crate and Barrel -- a few years back, we were out of glasses. I went to Target, bought 2 six packs of really cool looking 12 ounce glasses, Target brand.

Two days later, hubby found a tossed out wedding gift -- a six pack of Crate and Barrel really really cool looking glasses -- 12 ounces.

Three months later the Target brand glasses were mostly broken. We do dishes by hand -- and hubby pays no attention to the proper way to hand wash. Flatware in the sink to soak, glasses and cups first, then plates, finish the flatware, then cookware.

Less than six months in, all the Target brand was gone -- Crate and Barrel held up for three years... the last one was a casualty of the cat rampage.

And I started doing the dishes..... I hate dishes. The next house will have a dishwasher.

[Drover]

Is there room in your kitchen for a portable* dishwasher? After going several years without, we bought one and I swear it has saved our marriage.

* "Portable" being a relative term in this case...

[Tallysmom]

Originally Posted by Drover

Is there room in your kitchen for a portable* dishwasher? After going several years without, we bought one and I swear it has saved our marriage.

* "Portable" being a relative term in this case...

No. Darn it. The house is old and the kitchen was an afterthought. We've done some updating, but if we had a dishwasher put in, we'd have had to redo massive plumbing stuff and some major work.... and we are cheap.

For a lot of reasons (the biggest ones being that we've lost 75% of the high value of our house making it worth just under 20K more than we paid for it in 1987, 85% of the houses for sale in our area are foreclosures and there are LOTS more empty houses that aren't listed, and we may never get much out of the house when we sell in I hope to high heavens four to five years from now, so we're going to have to save major money to retire on, not to mention we live in a poorer section of town) I don't want to spend lots more money on it.

Although I love my house. It's cute. And my mortgage is 459 a month.

[greg42]

Originally Posted by Tallysmom

No. Darn it. The house is old and the kitchen was an afterthought. We've done some updating, but if we had a dishwasher put in, we'd have had to redo massive plumbing stuff and some major work.... and we are cheap.

A portable dishwasher doesn't need any plumbing changes; it just hooks to the tap and drains into the sink. You do need a little floor space to get it out of the way while it's not in use.

[rnc2mbfl]

As someone else has mentioned, Crate and Barrel is more contemporary and youthful than Pottery Barn. Even more youthful and contemporary is their newest concept store CB2. CB2 - Modern Furniture, Home Accessories, and more at cb2.com
For now, there are only 6 of these stores but they are really cool.