in search of the perfect gray sectional

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We had a lovely four day weekend and I finally had some time off from shooting and editing! Now, it’s Monday so back to the grind!

I have been wanting to do a post about finding a sectional. This is our main living area now. The area where the sofa is used to be the dining room – separated from the old kitchen by a wall which we took down (see photo below). When we renovated, we loved the idea of having our kitchen and main living area all sort of connected…since the kitchen really is the heart of our house. This setup works great for our daily living with the three of us (Mike, myself, and Zoey) but isn’t as functional when we have gatherings – we really need more seating in the living room, because since it is so close to the kitchen it really is where everyone congregates. So, the sofa you see pictured will be moving down into the lounge area of our master bedroom (more on that to come soon) and we will be replacing it with a sectional.

Below left – the dining are pre-remodel, and at the tail end of the remodel

So, to help with this lack of seating, we have been on the hunt for a gray sectional to add more seating to our living area. We have some criteria which are making our decision quite difficult! First, I’ll share my “dream” sectional:

Behold, the Jonathan Adler Lampert Sectional. Since this is my “dream” sectional, I’d of course upgrade the fabric to Grade 7 Brussels Charcoal and course get the walnut legs. The total comes to $5500. YIKES. I am sure worth every penny, but just not feasible for us! So began the hunt for something comparable but in our price range. Our criteria?

• Gray fabric (preferably not microfiber, since in our house it tends to collect dog hair!)
• Must be a sectional with arms on both ends – not a sofa with a chaise.
  
• Must fit in the dimensions of our room (max 110″ on the short wall and max 122″ on the railing wall)
• Modern style, preferably with some tufting since I am obsessed with tufting
• Cost less than $2500, but preferably less than 2k

So, with this criteria in mind (and our little tax refund in our pockets) we began the search many months ago. Some runners up (there were really not a lot of options that we found that we really loved):

Baxter Studio Alcoa Gray Sectional $1981.99 at overstock.com and free shipping

This one we *almost* went with. We love how the sections can be rearranged and we love the general look of it. However, we were really hesitant to spend so much money on a sofa we couldn’t test in person, and we were nervous that it would be too firm/uncomfortable. It does have great reviews online though.

Another runner up was the new CB2 Dual Sectional at $1799. However, it was out of the running because it didn’t have an arm on the left side, only a chaise:

We also came really close to getting the Phoenix sectional from Z Gallerie – we saw it in person and really liked it. But, I am so glad we didn’t. It’s pretty boxy (yet comfortable) but doesn’t have the tufting that I love.

Our search for the perfect sectional then took us to the Build a Sofa – where we found THE ONE. The Oliver Sectional for us was the perfect combination of everything we were looking for – we were able to customize it to have arms on both ends, it had the wonderful mid century look that we really wanted (including tufting), the size ended up being just perfect for our space, and we even were able to select our fabric, the firmness of our cushions, and the number of pillows and cushions. We chose medium density and we will have one long bench cushion on each sofa. The selection of fabrics in the basic grade A group was really great – we chose an option called Avalon Gray that is a really nice gray chenille (I think not unlike the Jonathan Adler dream sofa). I sound like an infomercial for Build A Sofa, but I think it is a really cool concept, and affordable for being able to customize a sofa. I will be sure to post photos and a review once it arrives (which is the only downfall – it takes 4-6 weeks). We are really, really hoping to receive it before Xmas since we will be hosting a family gathering at our house. Fingers crossed! When we went in on our first visit we selected all of the options and the total came out to almost $2700 which was just out of our budget (and this was including a $200 off per sectional piece sale). However, last week the saleslady called us to tell us that they would be having a black Friday sale promo for 20% off and free delivery (which previously was $99). So, we went for it! And the total came to $2416 for everything – a little more than we were hoping to spend but still within our budget. We can’t wait to see her in person! 

Tags: affordable gray sectional, build a sofa oliver sectional, modern gray sectional, modern tufted gray sectional