Out of all furniture objects, the chair may be the primary one. While many other pieces (apart from the bed) are created to support objects, the chair supports your human form. The term chair is intended to be looked upon here in the widest sense, from stool to throne to further forms like a bench and sofa, which may be regarded as extended or connected chairs, and whose character (i.e., whether they are intended for sitting or reclining) is not evidently distinguished.
The social history of the chair is as curious as its history as a creative craft. The chair is not merely a physical support and/or an aesthetic piece of art; it can also be a symbol of social status. At the past royal courts there were important connotations between having a chair with arms, on a chair with a back but without arms, or having to make do with a stool. In the past century, the director’s and manager’s chair has been iconic of superior standing, like in democratic governments the speaker sits on an elevated floor.
In its furniture construction, the chair can be used for a range of different forms. There are chairs created to attend to man’s age and physical condition (the high chair, the wheelchair) and to show his rank in society (the executive chair, the throne). Since past times there were chairs used for birth (birth chairs); since the 20th century, there have been chairs for ending life (the electric chair). There are chairs with one, two, three, or four legs, chairs with or without arms, and chairs with or without backs. We can make chairs that can be folded, chairs on wheels, and chairs on runners.
Modern living has designated unique chairs for automobiles and aircraft. All of these chair kinds has perfected to suit to growing human requirements. Due to its unique association with man, the chair lives to its full significance only when utilised. While it isn’t relevant to one’s appreciation of a cupboard or a bureau if there might be things inside or not, a chair is really understood and regarded best with a person using it, for chair and sitter require one another. Thus the different parts of the chair were given labels like the areas of the human form: arms, legs, feet, back, and seat.
Because the simple role of the chair is to support a human body, its value is judged principally from how fully it fulfills this practical function. In the structure of a chair, the carpenter is limited for certain static legislation and principal measurements. Inside these rules, however, the chair maker has great freedom.
The history of the chair extended over an era of several thousand years. There existed cultures that created distinctive chair forms, as expressive of the topmost work in the arenas of technique and creativity. From these such civilisations, individual mention should be made of ancient Egypt and Greece; China; Spain and The Netherlands in the 17th century; England in the 18th century; and France in the 18th century during the reigns of Louis XV and Louis XVI.
Egypt
Two ancient Egyptian chair forms, both the result of masterful design, are today a finding from tomb discoveries. First of them is a four-legged chair with a back, the other a folding stool. The original Egyptian chair would have had four legs designed like those of some animal, a curved seat, leading to a sloping back supported with vertical stretchers. From this a strong triangular form was crafted. There seemed to be no particular variation from the design of Egyptian thrones and chairs for regular populace. The only difference lies in the level of ornamentation, in the choice of more expensive inlays. The Egyptian folding stool in all likelihood was made for an easily stored seat for army officers. As a camp stool the chair stayed around until much later periods. But the stool also existed in the character of a ceremonial seat, its mechanical role as a folding stool being forgotten. This can already be observed, from as early as 1366–57 BC in two stools, formed in ebony with ivory inlay ornamentation and gold mounts, from the tomb of Tutankhamen. They are constructed in the structure of folding stools but can not be folded as the seats are formed with wood. The plain manufacture of the folding stool, being of two frames that cycle on metal bolts and hold a seat of leather or fabric fastened between them, was seen again at some time later as the Bronze Age folding chairs of Scandinavia and northern Germany. The most well known of this kind is the folding stool, crafted out of ashwood, seen at Guldhøj (National Museum in Copenhagen).
Greece and Rome
The iconic Greek chair, the klismos, is seen not from any ancient item still around but seen in a large amount of pictorial evidence. The better known is the klismos seen on the Hegeso Stele at the Dipylon burial area just out of Athens (c. 410 BC). This is a chair that had a backward-sloping, curved backboard and four curving legs, only two of them can be shown. These unique legs were likely to be crafted of bent wood and were likely to have been had to bear extreme pressure under the weight of the sitter. The joints securing the legs to the frame of the seat are therefore super stable and were clearly denoted.
The Romans emulated the Greek chair; quite a few models of seated Romans display evidence of a heavier and are a kind of less intricately built klismos. Both designs, the light or the heavy, were popularised during the Classicist time. The klismos design is known in French Empire furniture, in English Regency, and in special types of marked uniqueness around Denmark and Sweden during 1800.
China
The history of the chair in China can not be followed as well as that of Egypt and Greece. Since the Tang dynasty (AD 618–907) a full series of images and artworks has been kept, showing the inside and outer parts of Chinese houses and the furniture. Also preserved of the 16th century are some chairs crafted of wood or lacquered wood, that show an intriguing similarity to representations of past chairs.
Just like in Egypt, there were two particular chair forms in China: a chair with four legs and a folding stool. This chair is designed both with and without arms however never without the square seat and straight stiles (standing side supports) to support the back. In one form, it has been found, the stiles were slightly curved over the arms for the purpose of sit correctly with the form of the S-shaped back splat (the basic upright of its chairback). Together, all three sections had been mortised into the yoke-like top rail. Although the idea of this back splat later had a foundation for English chairs of the Queen Anne period, wooden pieces that just to a limited ability stabilise corner joints (and furthermore were loose in the bargain) represent a feature signatory to Chinese chairs. The four legs are set through the seat frame, which ends over the rounded staves. All the members are round in section or have rounded edges—acknowledging perhaps to the bamboo tradition. The seat is not pleasant and occasionally had a plaited form. These chairs required the sitter to remain stiff and upright; for when too much weight is placed on the back, the chair has a way of collapsing. In patriarchal Chinese houses of this epoch armchairs most likely were kept only for the senior members of the family, for they were esteemed greatly.
The Chinese folding stool is presumed to have been brought to China from the West. It does not differ much from the Egyptian or Scandinavian folding stools, but it has a dissimilarity in that the top rail is elegantly held to the two legs of the stool in a curved member, which is often provided with metal mounts. From a Western perspective the resulting effect of these furniture styles is stylized. The construction and aesthetic elements are combined in a way that is at the same time naïve and refined. The piecemeal appearance is an outcome of the way that the individual members do not seem to have been joined together with either glue or screws, but are mortised with one another and fixed in its place in the manner of a Chinese puzzle.
Spain: 17th century
The Golden Age of Spain in the 17th century also had its name on the chair. Paintings show a design of chair with a relatively brusque wooden frame; a back and seat, nailed on, having only two layers of leather, with horsehair stuffing in between, stitched to produce a pattern of little pads. The front board and a related board in the back could be folded after loosening some small iron hooks. Thus the chair was an easily portable piece of furniture while traveling which, in the same period, had the status of a four-legged, high-backed armchair.
The Netherlands: 17th century
A low, square, upholstered kind of chair can be displayed in engravings of the inside of rich Dutch homes by Abraham Bosse, a French artist, and also in paintings by the Dutch artists Johannes Vermeer and Gerard Terborch. While this design of chair can also be found in countries in which Dutch styles of interior decoration and Dutch furniture won favour, it is not believed that the design actually originated in The Netherlands. Typically, the legs of the chair were smooth, round in section, and of slender shape; they are in some cases baluster-shaped (vase-shaped) or twisted. It is unquestionably a bourgeois piece of furniture and was made in considerable amounts, as surmisable from one of Abraham Bosse’s engravings, in which there is an entire row of such chairs lined up against a wall. The design asserts itself by its elegant proportions and expensive upholstery in gilt leather or fabric bordered with fringes.
France and England: 17th and 18th centuries
The French Rococo chair in its most mature style—that was, as created in Paris around 1750—disseminated through most of Europe and has been imitated or copied in the mid-20th century. The design owes this popularity to a combination of comfort and elegance. The seat conforms to the human body and grants a relaxed sitting position. The back is bow-shaped, the legs curved. Generally the seat and back are upholstered, and there are tiny upholstered pads on the armrests. Smooth transitions are found between seat frame, legs, and back cover all the joints, which are constructed strongly on craftsmanlike methods in spite of the absence of stretchers between the legs.
French Rococo chairs and imitations of them use wood of fairly thick density; but all the members are deeply molded, all extraneous wood has been sanded away, and more expensive chairs can be further embellished with very delicate and decorative engravings. The wood could be varnished, stained, painted, or gilded. Silk damask or tapestry might be used for the upholstery on the seat, back, and armrests; canework is occasionally used instead of upholstery.
English chairs in the 18th century were more variable in form than the French. The French touch for stylistic uniformity, which spread from the aristocratic circles in Paris and Versailles through most of France and was popularised in many parts of the Continent, had no parallel in England. Prior to 1740, the most commonly used wood was walnut; thereafter, and for the rest of the century, it was mahogany. Walnut, though beautiful in hue, was soft and therefore less suited to wood carving than to rounded, curving forms. Outer surfaces, such as the back and seat frame, were usually veneered. During the walnut period, highly overstuffed armchairs, covered with leather or embroidered material, were also developed. The best upholstery of this period is precisely and firmly modelled and accentuated by braiding or tacks. When imports of mahogany became common, no specifically new chair designs appeared, but the character of the woodwork changed. Mahogany, having a firmer, closer grain, could be cut thinner, which meant that individual parts of the chair could be more slender in shape. Mahogany also lent itself better to carving than walnut. Carving was concentrated more on the arms and back than on the legs, which as a rule were straight and smooth with chamfered (bevelled) edges and molding. There was a wealth of variety in chairback designs, featuring elegant, pierced, vase-shaped splats or two upright posts connected by horizontal slats (ladderback).
Alongside the French Rococo chair and the best English chairs in walnut and mahogany, the stick-back chair was relatively unaffected by the stylistic changes of the day. Originally a medieval form, known, for example, from paintings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder and still found in mid-20th century in the churches and inns of southern Europe, the stick-back chair (in all of its variations) consists basically of a solid, saddle-shaped seat into which the legs, back staves, and possibly the armrests are directly mortised. This typically peasant form underwent a renewal and a process of refinement in England and America during the 18th century. Under the name Windsor chair (a term that seems to have been used for the first time in 1731) or Philadelphia chair, it became reknowned and was widely distributed throughout the world.
Late 18th to 20th century
During the Neoclassical period, no basic changes took place in chair forms, but legs became straight and dimensions lighter. Backs in the shape of classical vases replaced the fanciful outlines of the Rococo period. Around 1800, freely executed imitations of Greek and Roman chairs of the klismos type, with curved legs and backrest, appeared. French chairs of the Empire period, executed in dark mahogany and embellished with ornate bronze mounts, created a ponderous effect.
In cheaper brands of inferior workmanship, bourgeois chairs of the 19th century carried on the traditions of the 17th and 18th centuries. The only real innovations were the bentwood (wood that has been bent and shaped) chairs in beech that became popular all over the world and were still made in the 20th century. Around 1900 the continental Art Nouveau and Jugendstil styles (French and German styles characterized by organic foliate forms, sinuous lines, and non-geometric forms), and the Arts and Crafts movement in England (established by the English poet and decorator William Morris to reintroduce idealized standards of medieval craftsmanship), gave rise to original chair designs by Eugène Gaillard in France, Henry van de Velde in Belgium, Josef Hoffman in Austria, Antonio Gaudí in Spain, and Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Scotland. These new furniture styles did not exercise wide, let alone decisive, influence. The Art Nouveau chairs designed by the French architect Hector Guimard, for example, are collector’s pieces, but his name is known to a broader public only because of his fanciful entrances to the Paris Métro.
Modern
After World War I, the Bauhaus school in Germany became a creative centre for revolutionary thinking, resulting, for example, in tubular steel chairs designed by the architects Marcel Breuer, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and others. During World War II, the aircraft industry accelerated the development of laminated wood and molded plastic furniture. The dominant chair forms of this period go back to designs by Alvar Aalto, Bruno Mathsson, and Charles and Ray Eames. Rapid technical developments, in conjunction with an ever-increasing interest in human-factors engineering, or ergonomics, indicate that completely new chair forms will probably be evolved in the future.
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