The Original Howard Keith Cloud Collection

BRIEF HISTORY HK COMPANY

Founded in the early 1930s and building a great reputation through the 1940s and 50s, Howard Keith Furniture had become a leader of Great British furniture design and manufacturing from its London premises . By the 1970s, John Home was designing lounge furniture for Howard Keith. Its known that John Home’s designs helped HK London become a world leading maker of lounge furniture. In the 1970s The HK brand branched out into making cabinet quality coffee tables, desks and boardroom tables, as well as the lounge furniture they are known for. Howard Keith carried on producing high quality items throughout the 1960s, 70s and 80s, and 90s with well designed furniture that appealed to many furniture lovers and discerning home makers. The London factory was sold and HK London brand was sold. The company still produces wondaful custom made contemporary office designs and boardroom tables.

Howard Keith had gained a reputation not only because their designs stood out from most other large manufacturers of the time, but because they were elegant, untraditional and appealing to a market of buyers who were looking for something unique. Howard Keith could never be accused of playing it safe when designing furniture!

Due to the ever-growing demand of cutting edge quality designs, in the 1970s many institutions like The Bank of England, and top department stores, namely: Harrods, Heals of London and Well-known interior designers. The Howard Keith name had become prestigious and was well known amongst high-end interior designers. The British National Library, the Ocean Liner QE II and the Tate Britain have been proud owners of Howard Keith’s furniture designs.

Vintage sofa RESTORATION

We’d like you to read through a BRIEF DESCRIPTION of the RESTORATION PROCESS of a CLOUD sofa suite.If you own a Howard Keith Cloud sofa: HK Diplomat, HK Barbican or any other vintage, armchair of pouf.  and would like it restored, then “if I may say so” you have found the foremost experts in vintage restoration.  We can meticulously restore any lounge furniture, from the 1930s to the the present day.  All the old crumbling foam, wadding from the 1970s suites that’s a fire hazard, will be removed and replaced with new inners that comply with modern fire safety laws. We can do minor work or complete restoration on old worn out furniture. It can be restored to the showroom condition. By intrusting us to undertake the reupholstery work, we will preserve the comfort, craftsmanship and character of the original design while ensuring decades of future use.

The restoration of the sofa HK London CLOUD SOFA featured begins by carefully stripping the sofa back to its solid beechwood frame. Then the next step is some or all of original sprung seating is removed and then expertly reconditioned, with new springs fitted to provide another 50 years of comfort and support. The frame is then ready to be refurbished with a with high quality fire-retardant foam and soft fleece wadding.       

Once a new fabric is chosen, new quilted upholstery covers are then handcrafted, with individually stitched pockets, that are then filled through the with foam wrapped in fleece. Once complete, these bespoke quilted covers are expertly upholstered onto the beechwood frame over the newly fitted base foam, to create the distinctive cloud-like appearance of the HK Cloud sofa. Resulting in exceptional comfort that has made the Howard Keith Cloud Sofa an enduring design classic. 

We know that this process explains and recreates the signature look and comfort of the original HK Cloud Sofa.

Every restoration is carried out with the utmost attention to detail, combining traditional craftsmanship with modern materials to honour the integrity of this iconic British design.