British furniture designer Ernest Race came to prominence in the late 1940's with his collection of pared back designs, notably the DA1 chair and the DA6 sofa. I've been restoring these designs for over 30 years but it’s only in recent years that they are being appreciated as great examples of Post War Design.

Many of Race’s designs embraced the new materials of the time,as well as the DA1 chair & DA6 sofa, the Heron and Antelope chairs were manufactured using a steel framework. These were clearly influenced by the Victorian 'Iron Back' such as the one in this picture produced some 60 years earlier.

Due to their shape it would have been technically difficult to make these particular frames out of wood. This poses certain challenges for the upholsterer as all the hessians/fillings and fabric are hand-tied to the framework making them extremely labour intensive.

As you can see, this version of the DA6 sofa has wooden legs bolted to the metal framework. When it arrived at the workshop, it was in extremely poor condition. We replaced the original sprung seat with hand-tied coil springs and applied new hessians to the back, along with new rubberised hair and cotton waddings. The seat has a new hair top stuffing with a cotton wadding pre-cover.

The DA6 sofa is one of my favourite pieces to restore. Its simple clean lines are timeless and along with the DA1 chair it’s not hard to see why these iconic pieces are so sought after today.