Technology has changed how furniture is made.

Byline: Mary Beth Breckenridge

It used to be fairly easy to pick out a good-quality piece of upholstered furniture. You looked for eight-way hand-tied springs and a kiln-dried hardwood frame.

End of discussion.

But in the furniture industry, like the rest of the world, technology marches on.

Manufacturers have come up with all kinds of alternative materials and methods for building upholstered furniture, mostly to save time and money. Some of them, however, are giving hand-tied springs and hardwood frames a run for their positions on the top rung of the quality ladder.

Furniture maker Mitchell Gold Co. has even built an advertising campaign around its construction methods, which include the use of hardwood plywood in some pieces and serpentine springs instead of hand-tied coil springs.

Yet Mitchell Gold, president and chief executive officer of the company that bears his name, said many in the furniture industry have ...