Jennifer Litwin will help you get on the right track to home furnishings

March 18, 2005

By ERIN WADE / The Dallas Morning News

If you find shopping for furniture intimidating, you're not alone.

Even the most well-educated, self-assured adult can be reduced to a panicky bundle of nerves when faced with overwhelming choices in the furniture industry.

Is that sideboard 17th-century French or English? What's the difference between dovetail joinery and mortise and tenon? How can you tell solid wood from a veneer? Does it even matter? Yes, but even better is having some help.

Jennifer Litwin started out like most of us, a frustrated consumer (and an MBA-holding trade analyst) trying to buy furniture for her first home in Chicago.

After bouncing around from store to store and having a mortifying antiques experience, Ms. Litwin decided to learn everything she could about furniture and demystify the industry for others.

"I find that in big cities there is a lot of traffic and salespeople are too busy," she says. "I found price tags confusing and some antique stores very snobby."

She became an intern at Sotheby's auction house and, after acquiring a Rolodex full of contacts around the country, decided to compile a Zagat-style guidebook titled Furniture Hot Spots: The Best Furniture Stores and Websites Coast to Coast (Lyons Press, $14.95).

The book is in stores now.

She went undercover and scoured 500 stores, evaluating them on price, ambience, service and quality.

The 12 cities mentioned in her book are not ranked, she says, because each had its own special flavor. Seattle, for instance, had a wealth of Asian antiques, while consumers in Los Angeles could get more custom pieces because of all the local design students.

Miami had lots of art deco and over-the-top glitz, New Orleans was still dominated by French antiques, and Atlanta has a growing, vibrant community that was branching away from antiques.

Have a furniture question? Ms. Litwin takes pride in answering every email she receives through her Web site, www.jenniferlitwin.com.

She lists every store in her book online, as well as printable coupons for various stores.

"Ninety-five percent of people can't afford decorators," she says. "And most don't realize that even though you are not shopping with a designer, you can still get the designer discount if you ask."

E-mail ewade@dallasnews.com