So, my loveseat has some claw-damage from my kitty from before she learned to use the scratching post. The loveseat is still in pretty good shape aside from the claw damage, but I’m guessing a professional recovering of it would cost nearly as much as an all new one. In the catalogues slipcovers look nice at best and casual at worst, but try them at home or see them in someone’s house and they are all way too big and inclined to wrinkle and even when you tuck them in really good they just look like what they are: hiding the couch under a sheet. Has anyone ever had a off-the-rack slipcover that didn’t look awful?
Not I. I have a comfy old couch that’s starting to show its age. I bought one of those “Sure-Fit” slipcovers (heh, take that, Google Ads) and it was just as you say – looks great as long as you arrange it just right and never sit on it.
I’m planning to demote the couch to a less visible place and just buy a new one.
Nope. Mine looks crappy too.
I think Consumer Reports did something on slipcovers awhile back, and their conclusion was the same as yours.
I would urge you to consider professionally-made slipcovers. I had some done back in the 70’s. They fit perfectly and had all the detail of normal upholstery – no one would know it wasn’t the original fabric.
The best part was that they were washable. I just unzipped them and tossed them in the machine. I’ll bet I washed them every week – four kids, dogs, cats, etc.
They lasted forever, or until the color was way out of style. 
(They were a bright coral orange.)
If your loveseat frame and cushions are still in good shape and comfy, it’s not a bad option.
Provided the furniture you’re trying to cover is in good shape and you’re more interested in protecting it, you can always take the Italian route and get custom made vinyl see-thru slip covers. Just imagine how great that havest gold or olive green, Mediterranean-style sofa and love seat set will look and last with clear plastic armor.
And not only that, if you live in a place where it gets hot in the summer you’ll get yourself free leg depilation every summer.
Ikea has slipcovers for some of their sofas. Since they’re fitted, they look quite nice. I have a slipcover on the sofa I bought from them, and you wouldn’t be able to tell there was one. They even included foam strips to push into the cracks of the sofa to make sure it stays in place.
Of course, it was a righteous pain to put on in the first place, so I’ve never tried to take it off to wash. :smack:
I have had Slipcover Nightmare experiences in the past. Against my better judgment, I purchased a Lands’ End slipcover about a year ago (I just couldn’t take the harvest gold, burnt orange, and poop brown anymore). I am pleased to report that … it’s not that bad. I did purchase the “fit kit” that was advertised with it – it actually helped – and added a couple of safety pins in strategic and hidden locations.
No, it doesn’t look like the original upholstery. Yes, it’s somewhat high maintenance. Yes, when my husband sits on it and scootches around like a maniac, it gets messed up. But I smooth it out regularly, and really, it looks pretty good. Certainly it looks better than the 70s barf-a-rama that is my couch.
Yes, we plan to purchase a new sofa soon. Why do you ask? 
Is that how you spell scootch? It’s quite a descriptive word, but I’m not sure it’s exactly standard.
I have one from Pottery Barn, and while it’s not the GREATEST thing ever, it’s not terrible either. I figured it would be worth it to spend a little more than I thought was reasonable on the chance that it might not look terrible, and that seems to have worked out. I got it for exactly the same reason that you mentioned – the cat simply destroyed our sofa.
It does require a bit of work to keep it tidy, I have to straighten it up pretty much every night before we go to bed. If we’re having company over, I take it off completely and reinstall it with the “hardware” – those plastic stays that actually do a pretty good job of keeping it from sliding around too much. The biggest problem is that our sofa is a slightly unusual shape, it has the slightest bit of a contour to the backrest, and every slipcover I’ve seen is made for a couch with right angles. I feel like I would be completely happy with the slipcover if it were on a straight sofa, instead of 90% happy with it like I am now.
One funny thing is that I’ve really gotten to like the fact that I can throw it in the washing machine fairly often. We have another upholstered chair and sometimes I find myself a little sketched out by the fact that the chair fabric never gets washed the same way as the slipcover.
Mrs. RickJay has attempted to rehabiliate a number of shitty peices of furniture at Casa Jones over the years with a variety of slipcovers of various brands, sizes, styles and colors. Every single one of them looked like shit. Or, more precisely, like a sheet thrown over a crappy peice of furniture.
The fact of the matter is that the only really effective way of reupholstering a couch is to actually reupholster it. There’s no cheap and easy route.
She’s now determined to find yet another slipcover to cover our increasingly crappy-looking living room sofa. The results are so predictable that I’m actually considering just buying another damn sofa.
I don’t think you can get a slipcover that looks good unless you get one tailor-made to that sofa. If you really love the piece and plan to keep it a long time, do that, or just get it recovered. If not, then save your $ for a new sofa.
The only slipcover I’ve had that didn’t get messed up everytime it was sat on, was a stretchy nylon one, I got for an old recliner. It covered the holes in the upholstery and stayed put, but the fabric looked and felt like pantyhose.