About Old Boot
It started with a fascination for old sofas.
How it started
Back in 2011 we found ourselves drawn to the forgotten corners of flea markets, antique fairs and salvage yards.
Where others walked past worn-out sofas and tired old chairs, we saw something else. Beneath the faded fabric and cracked leather were beautifully proportioned designs, made using techniques that had stood the test of time.
A lot of them came home with us.
We stripped them apart completely, studied them, and rebuilt them several times over until we understood every detail. Finding people who could do that properly took a while, and the search eventually led us to Lancashire — a traditional home of British upholstery, shaped by the region's historic cotton mills.
Those early discoveries still guide how we do things today.
Learning from the originals
Over the years we've collected, dismantled and studied countless pieces of furniture. Not to copy them — to understand them.
Why did some designs still feel right decades later, while others dated almost immediately?
The answer was usually simpler than we expected. Good proportions. Honest materials. Thoughtful details. Nothing clever, nothing fashionable — just decisions made properly the first time.
A lot of the sofas and chairs we make today owe their shape to those original finds.
Why Old Boot?
People ask about the name a lot.
An old boot is something that's been properly lived with. Comfortable, familiar, full of character. It carries the marks of everywhere it's been, and it gets better with age rather than worse.
That's the feeling we wanted the furniture to have. Not something that looks perfect the day it arrives and slowly loses its appeal — something that feels at home from the first evening and picks up more character as the years go by.
Furniture made to be used.
Building something different
We've never been interested in chasing trends.
The aim was always furniture that looked equally at home in a modern flat or a country cottage. Furniture with personality. Furniture that would still look good in ten or twenty years, and that people could genuinely live with. That's still how every decision gets made.
Handmade in Lancashire
Every Old Boot sofa and chair is made by hand, to order, in our Lancashire workshop. Working closely with the same upholstery makers year after year means we can be certain about quality and consistency at every stage — from selecting hides and marking patterns through to deep buttoning, hand-tacked studs and final inspection.
Our workshop
Our Matlock showroom
Old Boot's first showroom opened on Wandsworth High Street in London, before moving to a larger space in Fulham.
These days we're in the Derbyshire Dales, which several of us have long called home. The search for a showroom led us to a former fire station in Matlock — built in the 1930s, with exposed brickwork, steel details and big glazed rooflights. It felt right immediately.
Beautiful countryside. Traditional craftsmanship. Independent businesses. A setting that reflects the furniture itself.
The showroom holds a huge selection, so you can sit on the sofas, look through full hides and fabric hangers, and take as long as you like. There's no hard sell — just honest advice, good coffee and plenty of time to browse.
Looking forward
The furniture industry has changed enormously since we started.
What hasn't changed is our belief that well-made furniture should have character. Not manufactured character — the real sort, that comes from thoughtful design, honest materials, proper craftsmanship and years of being lived with.
That's what we looked for in those first flea market finds. It's what we build now.
