How to pack antique furniture

Packing your antique furniture for moving, or for storage, requires special attention. Antique furniture is expensive. If it is damaged, it will be hard, if not impossible to repair. In addition, if you find someone who has the skills to repair antique furniture, it is going to be very expensive. That is why before you call your movers Gloucester MA to come and pick up your antique furniture, you need to make sure that everything is packed properly. Of course, in situations like this, the best solution would be to hire professional packers to pack antique furniture and to prepare it for the moving truck.

Bubble plastic and duck tape ready to pack antique furniture
Professionals will pack antique furniture better than you

Hire professionals to pack antique furniture properly

So, the best way to pack your antique furniture for storage or moving is to hire professional moving services NH to do it for you. They know how to pack and protect your valuable furniture pieces. Professional moving companies have specially trained staff for packing valuable and bulky furniture, and they are doing it every day. And most importantly, if some of your pieces do get damaged somehow, the insurance will cover it. Therefore, professional packers are your best option.

Pack antique furniture on your own

Of course, there are people who do not like when strangers have to go through their belongings. So, they usually decide to pack alone, even though packing is a complicated task. If you are one of those persons, and you would like to pack on your own you should inspect your furniture pieces a little bit closer. If you are planning to store your antique furniture, you should know all the materials your furniture is made of. But usually, you can expect to find wood, metal, and leather. Why is this important? Well, if you are planning to store your furniture for longer periods, you need to do everything you can to create perfect conditions for those materials to survive. And that includes different types of products for cleaning and maintenance.

Bubble plastic sheets
Prepare lots of bubble plastic

Prepare suitable packing supplies

If you want to pack antique furniture properly, you will need to gather some packing supplies. Of course, if you are packing your whole home for a move, you will need to get moving boxes, but those are not necessary when packing furniture. For packing furniture, you will need moving blankets, bubble plastic, packing tapes and similar. Here is the list of required packing materials when you want to pack antique furniture.

  • Get lots of moving blankets, they will provide protection when you pack antique furniture, and keep it from scratching and damaging.
  • Bubble plastic sheets or in a roll are good for protecting legs and other smaller wooden pieces.
  • Stretch wrap can also be very useful when packing antique furniture
  • Packing tape
  • Plastic bags for screws and other small parts

Prepare cleaning and care products if you want to pack antique furniture properly

Keep in mind that if you are planning to store your antique furniture you will need some leather and wood cleaning and care products. So, while you are getting your packing supplies, you should also gather products for maintaining antique furniture. There are special cleaning products for every different material, so make sure that you get products suitable for leather and suitable for wood. Even though, wood and leather are usually the most obvious materials. Do not forget about, screws and other metal parts. You will need to take care of them, as well. Again, find the appropriate type of product and use it according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Clean and maintain your pieces

Cleaning and preserving your antique furniture before storing is crucial if you do not want your items to deteriorate over time. Of course, in the very long run, this is inevitable. But if you handle your furniture pieces with care, you can prolong their life span significantly. So, before you decide to pack antique furniture you should try to disassemble it. Unfortunately, the biggest problem with moving antique furniture is that it is very hard, and sometimes impossible to disassemble. Construction parts are usually glued and hidden under the thick leather lining, and they are impossible to reach using conventional means. This means that it will be very hard to clean and apply care products on all surfaces.

Another very inconvenient thing is that those antique furniture pieces are really difficult to maneuver if they can’t be taken apart. That is why they are in great danger of being damaged during a move.

Vintage leather armchair
Antique furniture is hard to disassemble

Disassembling and care

Luckily there are some small companies that will do the antique furniture disassembling for you. But do it only if they can later assemble it in your home. If you managed to disassemble your furniture you will have easy access to those hidden parts, and therefore you will be able to clean take care of them properly. On the other hand, if your furniture will remain in on piece, you need to give your best to reach the most tucked in parts, to clean and apply care products. Take special attention to leather parts of your antique furniture. The leather is the most delicate material in your antiques and it is most likely to deteriorate over time. That is why you should apply a thick layer of leather conditioner before conserving it with stretch wrap.

You should do this even if you hired professional packing services NH to pack your antiques.

Pack antique furniture

If you have cleaned and applied care products it is time to pack antique furniture. Wrap wooden parts with few layers of bubble plastic. If your furniture is in one piece use moving blankets to wrap them securely. Use stretch wrap, tie everything together, and do not be afraid to add several layers. It will provide perfect protection if there is a thick layer shielding your furniture. And that is it, your furniture is ready for moving or storage.

As you can see, there is much work to be done when you want to pack antique furniture. That is why the smartest thing to do is to hire moving companies in Massachusetts to pack and move your valuable furniture pieces. They will save you from the bother of packing furniture. And most importantly, they can do it better than you.