Whether intentional or not, it is just a basic fact that particle board wears extremely poorly. If it gets damp, it expands and warps and veneers lift up and cr

Whether intentional or not, it is just a basic fact that particle board wears extremely poorly. If it gets damp, it expands and warps and veneers lift up and crack, if the veneer gets scratched deeply enough to expose the particle board, you generally can't sand it and refinish it. Corners get banged up, exposing the particle board beneath, which is then more subject to wear and moisture, accelerating the process that leads to the piece ending up on the curb. Particle board furniture also weighs more than furniture made of real hardwoods, often a lot more. Making it harder to take with you when you move, and harder to sell used. Particle board doesn't handle being taken apart and put back together (e.g. taking legs off of something to get it through a door) as well as real wood does. There are several good reasons furniture is made of particle board today (primarily that humanity chewed through the world's old growth hardwoods over the past couple of centuries, and it'll take more than a few of our lifetimes for them to return if humanity survives long enough to figure out how to be responsible stewards of forests), but there aren't any reasons for consumers to prefer particle board over hardwood furniture from the past, especially when real hardwood furniture from the past is cheaper than new particle board furniture. Let's just say that I've seen a lot of furniture in my life and I have never seen an old (i.e. mid-century, when it began to be a thing manufacturers toyed with) piece of predominantly particle board furniture that I'd want in my house, have you? I have, on the other hand, seen and owned pieces of hardwood furniture that were still beautiful and functional at well over a hundred years old (you can find older than that, too, but, at least in the US, you'll find that even in this poor antiques market they're likely more expensive than similar new furniture). I personally won't own particle board furniture. I won't buy it from Ikea (technological and logistical marvel it may be, good furniture it is not), or from Ethan Allen, or anyone else, no matter how beautiful it looks on the showroom floor. Because, I know that in a few years, it will look much worse than a good piece of hardwood furniture. And, I'll probably have needed to move it at least once, and it really is often stupidly heavy.