A modular sofa gives you a sofa that can change with the room. Poliform, the house from Inverigo in northern Italy, makes several of them, and two recent families by Jean-Marie Massaud show how far the idea stretches. Ernest is loose and soft. Savoy shows its frame. Both let you add a module in two years and keep the look.
Sketch the outline before the modules
A modular sofa starts on paper. Draw the room with the doors, the windows, the fireplace and the television, and then decide the shape: a straight row on a wall, an L around a corner, an island in the middle of an open plan room, or two groups facing each other.
The shape decides the modules. A row needs seats and two ends. An L adds a corner or a chaise. An island needs backs on both sides. Leave about three feet of path behind any sofa that stands free, and 14 to 18 inches between the seat and a coffee table.
Five decisions, in order
Take the decisions from the top. Each one narrows the next, and the cover comes last because it changes the price and leaves the layout alone.
Ernest: comfort taken apart
Poliform Ernest arrived in 2024. Massaud built it from modules with soft, deconstructed volumes, inspired by a down cushion. Backs and seats sit loose and take their shape as you use them. The modules make small or large sofas, straight or in an L.
The armchair is a single module of the sofa. That sounds like a detail and matters a lot in a corner group: the chair and the sofa share depth, height and feel, so they line up to the inch. Add the pouf to the armchair and you get a chaise longue.
The Ernest side tables continue the modular idea. They fit together like a puzzle, in the middle of the room or one by one beside the sofa. Ernest suits a family room. If your sofa must look untouched each morning, look at a firmer family. See the Ernest collection.
Savoy: the structure on show
Poliform Savoy is the newest seating family in the catalog, from 2026. Massaud set generous cushions inside a structure that stays in view, drawing on modernism. Most sofas hide their frame under upholstery. Savoy lets you see its build.
The visible frame changes the joints. On a hidden-frame sofa the seams between modules are something to disguise; on Savoy they belong to the drawing, so a long run holds together. Plan for the practical side too: the finish of the frame matters as much as the cover, and it takes the knock of a vacuum cleaner. The 2026 coffee tables share the geometry and stand inside the arrangement. See the Savoy collection.
A Savoy coffee table, 2026. The tables share the geometry of the sofa and stand inside a module arrangement.
Order now, add later
A modular sofa lets you buy the core now and the rest later. Buy the seats and ends that fit this year's room. In a new apartment, add the chaise or the corner once you have lived there a season.
Two things help. Keep a note of the exact cover and finish you ordered, with the reference from the quote. And when you add a module, order its covers to match at the same time, a step many buyers forget to ask about.
Depth and padding
Some families offer two seat depths. Mondrian does, for rooms that sit upright for conversation by day and low for a film at night. Westside comes in a firm version and in Westside Soft with feather padding. Feather gives more and needs plumping; foam keeps its line. Try both if you can, since a showroom minute tells you more than a paragraph.
Two Poliform modular sofas
The numbers we need
A plan of the room with the wall lengths in inches, the position of the television or the view, the shape you have in mind and the number of seats. Tell us whether the sofa has to stand free or against a wall.
Send those through the form at the foot of the page. We reply with a module list for Ernest, Savoy or both, drawn to your room, and a written price with each module on its own line.