Recognizing High-Quality Furniture: Material, Craftsmanship, Certificates

Under the German trade convention (DIN 68871), a piece of furniture may only call itself “solid wood furniture” if all parts except the back panel and drawer bottoms are made of solid wood of the stated species. Veneer, in turn, is real wood in thin leaves (trade definition per DIN 68330), applied to dimensionally stable substrates – resource-efficient, low-warp and, for large surfaces with a continuous grain pattern, often the technically better solution. A cleanly veneered sideboard of Italian manufacture is not a compromise but craftsmanship. Objective material characteristics come from wood databases: oak, for example, brings high surface hardness with a raw density of around 0.71 g/cm³ – ideal for heavily used surfaces; softer species score with looks and feel. That is not a ranking but a matching of material to purpose.

In wood-based materials, formaldehyde is the regulated pollutant. The established emission class E1 corresponds to a maximum of 0.124 mg/m³ in the test chamber. Important for anyone buying furniture now: with EU Regulation 2023/1464, a stricter limit of 0.062 mg/m³ applies EU-wide from August 6, 2026 to furniture and wood-based products. Reputable manufacturers already meet this level today – asking costs nothing and quickly separates the wheat from the chaff.

Two labels have substance and clear institutions behind them: FSC (Forest Stewardship Council, founded 1994) certifies wood from responsibly managed forests – over 160 million hectares worldwide, with independent third-party auditing and the product labels FSC 100%, FSC Mix and FSC Recycled. OEKO-TEX Standard 100 (issued in Zurich) tests textiles for more than 1000 harmful substances – every component of an article, with annually updated limit values that in part go beyond legal requirements. Our own brand NUVOSETTE, for example, manufactures to the OEKO-TEX standard. Labels do not replace looking closely, but they objectify two questions: where does the wood come from, and what is in the fabric?

With a sofa, the invisible decides – here we are in the territory of trade practice, and we flag it as such: a dimensionally stable frame of solid or laminated wood, high-quality suspension, a foam core with sufficient foam density (kilograms per cubic meter – more material generally means more shape retention) and a cover with tested abrasion resistance (Martindale method). Two questions you may put to any salesperson: what is the foam density of the seat foam? How many Martindale rubs does the cover withstand?