Antique Furniture Care

horsehair upholstery fabric

Started by 1881victorian · October 12, 2010 · 1 post

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Antique Furniture Care thread on victorianforum.com · started October 12, 2010 by 1881victorian · 1 post · discussion in 2010.

I know that we have discussed this a bit on the forum before, but I wanted to ask again if anybody can speak to the width of horsehair fabric. Specifically, I am familiar with the following two suppliers of fabric. http://www.johnboydtextiles.co.uk/…

I know that we have discussed this a bit on the forum before, but I wanted to ask again if anybody can speak to the width of horsehair fabric.  Specifically, I am familiar with the following two suppliers of fabric.

http://www.johnboydtextiles.co.uk/
http://www.horsehairfabrics.com/

What vexes me, so to speak, is that I have a settee in need of new upholstery that has a seemless black horsehair fabric on the seat that is wider than 30 inches (front of frame to back of frame, as measured along the fabric).  I am left to assume that horsehair fabric was once available in larger widths than what is available today--and I recognize that the width is limited to the actual length of the horse's hair. 

Does anybody know of a source of either wider fabric or a substitute material that would pass as a convincing stand-in? 

Thank you,
Jason