3.12.2008

Pilgrimage to IKEA

I've been to plenty of furniture stores, but my first trip to IKEA last week was eye-opening. I had been told over and over by friends that I HAVE to try this place, that I'd LOVE it, but I don't have one of these stores nearby, so I never had... until we saw the huge blue building across from Mall of America. Yes, that's a parking garage underneath the building. People around here in Indiana talk about it as if it's Mecca- they are excited to take long trips to the Chicago store to get there to buy everything.

We went to IKEA after the mall, so would have spent more time there had we not already been tired and shopped-out. I loved looking at the innovative furniture designs. I'm a gadget-y and practical type of person, so the creative ideas for saving space that many of the products solved were very cool- and affordable! Unfortunately, I tend to like more of a country-decor and much of the furniture was designed for modern or minimalist apartments, and wouldn't fit in our place. But no less cool! There was some wood kitchen tables, dressers & beds we did like- but we're not in the market for them right now.

What's your favorite part of IKEA?

9 comments:

Lisa said...

The squid toys are my favorite. They are hard to find anywhere else.

For a while, I didn't have to do captchas to comment.. now I do again. Did you change it?

RetroBrett said...

That's funny. There's actually a new IKEA opening in Cincinnati this week. Also funny is that my wife and I will try to stop in at the Cincy IKEA this weekend while we're traveling the Buckeye State.

We've been to the Chicago IKEA twice and enjoyed both trips. We haven't bought a lot of stuff there: dining room chairs, curtains/curtain rods, light fixtures, etc. It's all been pretty decent stuff. I mean, it's cheap and a lot of it is assemble-it-yourself kind of stuff so I wouldn't really call it heirloom quality or anything. But the prices are good and the variety is great.

In addition to the low prices, I like the style and the variety of things they offer. The style fits my mid-century modern taste in furniture. And they really do have a lot of options in addressing both form and function. Plus, they have things you really can't find at "normal" furniture stores. Typically, if you want that kind of style and uniqueness, you have to either pay gobs of money at a specialty store/website or luck into a deal at Goodwill or on eBay.

I'd prefer to luck into a deal but those deals are getting more and more difficult to find with the popularity of eBay and Goodwill's online auction site.

Joanna said...

I changed it, for now. I was getting spam comments linking to virus-harboring sites at the rate of 1-2/day for a few days, and hoped the captchas would ward those off for a while. When I think I'm off the spammer's radar (or if enough people vote against it), I'll get rid of the captcha again.

Kacie said...

Good to know! I've been meaning to check out my local IKEA. It's um...just on the south side of Pittsburgh. I really have no excuse not to visit, right?

I'm just afraid I'll go crazy and buy a bunch of stuff I don't need.

Kacie said...

Also, I hate spam! So I don't mind typing in "tfnmck" or whatever the captcha wants me to type.

Melissa Whittington said...

We have a couple dressers and a few lamps from IKEA. Oh, and our desks! Hm, and a chair. Hehe, maybe more.

I like the prices and for our "style" we like minimalistic.

Sometimes we just like going to IKEA to stroll around. And then at the end have a meal in the cafeteria! You definitely should try the Swedish meatball meal! It's very tasty.

ashley said...

I love Ikea! Paul and I hang out there all the time. We go, have some of there 50 cent hot dogs, wander around. Sometimes we sit on the couches and people watch. Or we rearrange our house with items we see. Slowly, our house is becoming more and more Ikea-filled. :-) I like combining the simple and contemporary style of Ikea with my own style.

Anonymous said...

Trent too loves IKEA. I've never been, but we have a blue tunnel that the kids love crawling through. Plus he bought them each a toy holder that hangs from the ceiling. I need to look for that out in the garage. I think it is more for Kevin's age. Trent did almost his entire bedroom in IKEA. We like their bag holders. They are very modern.

Matt Moberly said...

I've never been to an IKEA, but from what I've seen, I think my favorite part would be the Lisa Loeb concerts.

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