When I saw this cage on the website, I was happy that finally designers invented a cage which is nice looking and not a plastic monstrum in the corner of the room. But still there are some dark sides beside the nice look...
First it was really time consuming to build it together. I had a drill, but still it took me finally... two days:)! Well, I did not worked nonstop and I am a lady, but still. You have to be prepared. Building IKEA furniture is fun comparing to that.
Functionality. I have two guinea pigs living in this cage. Pigs were scared to use these stairs (in two months period). To fix it, I made edges and glued some hemp-mats between the stairs.
But the main thing is the narrow edge of the first level. Every morning there is a load of hay, bedding material and raisins on the floor on the half meter radius of the cage. Behind the cage there is a pile of sawdust+hay. My natural oiled oak parquet is partly ruined as pigs managed to pee somehow in spite of the edge between the bars.
And the design... You have to be prepared this cage is massively big. I have big rooms, but still it is a huge wooden block which is nicely white outside, but dark inside (you cannot see animals inside it very well). Next time I would choose Natural Living cage.
But positive things are that I belive pigs have plenty of room there and that is nice. And it is not made from plastic. To improve using it, I have to change type of lining (fleece, mats instead of sawdust) and maybe build some plywood barriers between the narroe edge of the first floor.
I bought this cage for my two guinea pigs, it's great because they have loads of space to run about and don't have to sleep on top of eachother, plus it's really pretty. The downsides however are that it's impossible to catch them from the downstairs as there is only one small door. I use sawdust and it gets kicked out the bottom all the time meaning I've had to make a makeshift barrier, as well as the hay falling out the little trough this means the cage certainly wouldn't be good for a carpeted floor! Cleaning it out is really fiddly as the drawers don't slide out very easily. I'm not sure it's worth the money I paid for it! :(