Furniture shops in Karachi – Part 2

Almost a year back, I was searching for furniture shops in Karachi to build my kitchen, get furniture for drawing, dining, living and bed rooms. I had a budget and I managed to maintain it with the desired quality. One year down the road and I am satisfied with my choices. Below are my suggestions to help you out, if you have an above-average budget and require good quality, giving you some ideas on furniture shops in Karachi:

• Kitchen
• You have a choice to hire a carpenter to construct cabinets. This will be less costly but requires a lot of your time. But, if the carpenter is good enough, you can control the quality and I found this the most suitable within my budget. You’ll also have to manage polishing. If you like to be very selective in terms of best wood and design, plus other apparels, this is the best option for you.
• Order kitchen from Ashary’s, Clifton (expensive), Interwood, Tuaheed Commercial (expensive), Italian Kitchen, Shaheed-e-Millat (moderate), Habitt (moderate) etc.
• If you go for a carpenter, appliances such as Built-in Oven or normal Oven, hob (stove), hood (chimney) and microwave will be managed by you; plus electrician and plumber for respective sockets.

• Bed room
• Well, you have a lot of choices here. As per my limited knowledge, the best bedroom furniture in Karachi market is available at International (Tipu Sultan) and Victoria (near Abdullah Haroon road). International’s quality and service is excellent. They provide life time support at your doorstep and have a very skilled team. Though furniture is very expensive, but when you see it, you’ll know the worth, especially if you want to own it for over 20 years!
• Wellcome furnishers (near old sabzi mandi) has a lot of variety as well and they also provide good support, but again it’s expensive. You can also have a look at Habitt (Nipa, Tipu Sultan, etc.) which is less expensive and ready-made.
• The furniture market in Nursery, Karachi is the cheapest of all I’ve mentioned

• Drawing room
• Wellcome Furnishers is the best value for this kind of furniture. The price is moderate as compared to the expensive ones and obviously you’d not like to spend a lot on drawing room where you don’t spend your time that much. They have the right variety to satisfy one with a above-average budget. If you have a higher budget, you can visit International and Vicrtoria.
• Kalamkaar (Clifton) is another option, I found their way of showing the catalog great. The price is above-average, but they have good choices. They even hand over a CD to you for your brief reviewSam Abbas (Tuaheed Commercial) is another choice, but I didn’t find a lot of variety there.

• Dining
• Again, Wellcome is the best value in terms of quality and price. Kalamkaar has good choices as well
• Nursery is another option which is less expensive

• Living room
• Nursery. Why? Because I’d like to have my living room furniture replaced after 3-5 years. Habitt is another good choice balancing the price and comfort. But, I’d go for cheaper furniture because living room is very roughly used. Just ensure that you get the right material keeping in mind Karachi gets pretty hot during summers.
• If you like to go for higher value choices, International, Wellcome and KalamKaar might be worth looking.

In addition to this, you will need to buy curtains, manage lighting, doors and other appliances. I’ll be writing on the same in the near future.

Furniture in Karachi

Whether you're going to build up a new home or you need to upgrade your current one, you'll find it hard to get great furniture. People like us who work throughout the week and find time only on the weekends during the daytime, find it hard to know where to go and have very little time for exploration. I have been trying to search for good furniture shops on the internet, the locations and the quality for each vendor, but one way or the other have hard time in locating one and finding quality within budget.

While the quality of furniture in the famous Furniture Markets (Nursery & near Garden) is controversial :), established brands seem a better choice if your budget is above average.

I, for one, didn't even know the names of the places where we can buy good furniture. While the search is still on, here goes my evaluation so far:

• International Interior Designers & Furniture (Tipu Sultan Road)
  Bedroom Furniture. Is very expensive but Teak wood variety is present which is termite-proof). Takes around 2-3 months to delivery based on the quantity.
  Sofa sets and other furniture is also available, not too sure about Kitchen.
  
• Sam Abbas Design Studio (Tuaheed Commercial, DHA, near Gelato Affair/Biryani Center)
  Mainly Sofa sets, is expensive but affordable to people who desire better furniture. Mostly Sheesham
  
• Interwood (Tuaheed Commerical, DHA, besides Mosaajees)
  Kitchens are great but very expensive. Other furniture also available in good ranges
  
• KalamKaar (near Schon Circle, Clifton)
  Bedroom, Sofa Sets & other furniture is available, but again not cheap, but affordable prices. They dealt with us in a very nice manner and the catalogue is very rich.
  
• Habitt (Tipu Sultan & somewhere in Gulshan as well)
  Generally everything is available on less expensive side as compared to the branding. I was not comfortable about the quality of some of the items e.g. the wood being used is not that durable.

I am still short of all the furniture except for the bedroom and looking for options, mainly for affordable Kitchen building and will be visiting Ashrays, ST (or Estee?) and Dreams in DHA area. There's one other shop by the name of Prestige Kitchens which I plan to explore as well.

Once I am over with the whole deal, I'll write on the summarized analysis of the same so that buyers have consolidated knowledge in one place.