You can find ‘hacks’, or ways of changing self-assembly furniture after you’ve purchased it, all over the web. Largely intended for products from a well-known Swedish superstore, hacks normally involve a fair amount of faff and fuss. And the results may be less than wonderful. OK, let’s admit it, sometimes they’re just plain hideous.

Often a hack is an attempt to make furniture look built-in and bespoke. Or more decorative and individual. The words “embellished” and “beautification” are frequently used, with no apparent irony. And all this effort is dedicated to transforming furniture that isn’t necessarily well-made or durable in the first place.

Blue Jali bespoke dresser with flowers

At Jali, we want everyone to have self-assembly furniture that is individual and bespoke, without paying a fortune or spending time ‘hacking’ it afterwards.

I remember a friend telling me how fed up she was seeing the same items, from the same retailers, in all her friends’ houses. She wanted her home to reflect who she was; her choices, her taste, her personality.

She was tired of looking for products that would fit her rooms, and her plans, and not being able to find them.

Jali furniture is perfect for people like my friend. We give you almost unlimited scope to design pieces that fit even awkward spaces exactly. And we put all kinds of great design options at your fingertips, to ensure your furniture is unique and personal to you, right there at the start, in the design process.

Of course, we’ll be delighted if you want to add your own touches once you’ve assembled your furniture – we just want to make sure you don’t have to! In fact, in a recent post, I featured just such a project, which was incredibly successful. (We had a lovely mention and thanks from interiors blogger Kimberly Duran – find it on the Swoon Worthy blog here.)

Jali bespoke furniture including decorative shutters and radiator cover

For example, you can have dressers or cupboards with doors made with our beautiful fretwork, then match or contrast them, as above, with decorative shutters, screens, radiator covers…

There is another advantage to buying Jali products. Because they are so well-made, they last much longer than some other self-assembly furniture on the market. And we keep all the data on the pieces you order on our system. So if you do eventually decide to update them, we can provide new parts with exactly the same measurements, so they’ll fit perfectly –and go on delighting you for many more years.

This means a new lease of life for still-usable furniture, and reduces the amount going into land-fill. You pay much less for a fresh new look, with the knowledge that you’re doing the right thing by the planet. Not so much a hack as a heck of a good thing all round, I’d say…