I’ve made a few lowback chairs, but I haven’t been happy with any of them.
Part of the problem is aesthetic. Lowback Windsors – sometimes called “captain’s chairs” or “firehouse Windsors” – are in every sketchy seafood restaurant in the United States. They feature lifeless turnings, a dark and shiny finish and questionable comfort. (The sooner you finish chewing the chum, the sooner the next party can be seated.)
The form doesn’t sell particularly well. Even John Brown had difficulty getting rid of his lowbacks, which he called a “smoker’s bow.”
And yet, I think they are worth studying. I have been keen to design one that is both comfortable and doesn’t look at home on a carpet stained by malt vinegar and tartar sauce. And I want to include its details in “The Stick Chair Book.”
So for the last few weekends, I’ve been sketching chairs and thinking – a lot – about angles and radii.
One of the recent shocks to my chairmaking brain has been the Irish Gibson chair. Its back sticks look radically sloped, and when I first saw a photo of one I wondered if it was used by Irish dentists to examine patients.
After building several Gibsons and living with them, my brain has a different take on angles. The 25° slope of the Gibson’s back sticks does not make the chair feel at all like a recliner. In Ireland they are sometimes called “kitchen chairs,” and I get that. They are a comfortable place to sit after a day’s work and engage with the household around you.
But the Gibson isn’t a lowback chair. I guess I’d call it an Irish comb back (or a Gibson chair).
One of the other compact chairs I admire is, of course, the Jennie Alexander chair. It’s not a lowback. It’s not even a stick Windsor. But it has some essential geometry that is almost identical to a Gibson. The top splat of the examples I’ve studied is about 25° to 28° off the seat, and it hits the human spine the same place that a Gibson does. Oh, and the curvature of the backs of the two chairs is pretty close, too.
With this target in mind I’ve been designing lowbacks with this 25°-28° tilt in mind. And using a similar curvature as well. It feels a little weird grafting these dimensions onto a stick chair. But after doing some drawings – both in pencil and with mouse – it doesn’t look weird at all.
I struggled with how to bend an arm that was pitched at 28°, curved with an 11″ radius and with a bottom edge that was parallel to the floor. I built jigs in my head. I visited some geometry websites that made me question my journalism degree.
After a few long walks, however, the scales fell from my eyes. I was making it too difficult. As always. After I finish up these two Scottish comb-back chairs, I’ll build a prototype lowback using parts from my boneyard of extra chair parts (population: 756 and growing).
— Christopher Schwarz
Read other posts from the “Making Book” series here.
Captain’s chairs were popular in homes when I was young, and still are in seafood restaurants, which abound here near the ocean. I doubt very much you could ever convince me to appreciate them. They just have too many negative connotations, over too long a time.
The mass produced versions are horribly uncomfortable. The back hits mine in just the wrong place. I’d be happier if they were stools. At least then I wouldn’t be tempted to lean back.
And the parts are always so heavy. To the eye, they seem twice as thick as a nice Windsor. The JA chair seems light and airy in comparison. I appreciate the comparisons to their geometry. Maybe I can still be convinced. But I got off to a really bad start, a long time ago, with both spinach and captain’s chairs. I’ve been happy doing without both.
My disdain for captain’s chairs (and their armless compadres, the “mates” chair) was fostered many years ago. Having spent 45+ years doing restoration and repair work, I’m still reminded of the countless captains chairs a local restauranteur would bring me for repair and clean-up work. About once a month he would show up with 5-6 of his chairs to be “gone over” and they were always food encrusted to the point I’d wonder how they could have fallen apart with that much gravy, mashed potatoes and spilled milk seemingly holding the whole thing intact. When the chairs were retrieved, my shop seemed to reek of stale popcorn and ass for a week. The owner always dropped them off having crammed them into his top of the line Cadillac. Sorta made me wonder if eating in his establishment was the best choice…..
It’s funny you mention the chair parts boneyard. I was just thinking about that yesterday. I’ve built 3 chairs and I already have a growing collection of wayward chair parts.
Wow great insight into your design process/struggle. Also it’s becoming very clear to me that my understanding of chair design styles ends at “it has arm rests, or it does not”.
Good stuff nonetheless.
The chair chapters (particularly chapters 14 to 18) of Chris’ ADB are densely packed with critical information about stick chairs, and I go there regularly. I’m always pleased to find stuff that I missed the last time. Now I’m hungry for the stick chair book. Your good work for readers of LAP books is appreciated, as are the blogs from LAP.
I think it might be an idea to check out the Appalachian style 2 and 3 ladder chairs by Brian Boggs….. He does the radical rear leg bend using steam bending techniques. Of course, you could use that “funny” wood that is plasticized and dries to the required form without bend-back.
That Jennie Alexander chair is really beautiful. A very smooth chair form. ( note, it looks like English Brown Oak with Elm bark seat.)
I was intrigued by the Jimmy Possum chairs in the last Mortise and Tenon magazine. Have those been part of your research? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you mention them.
I’ve written about them several times here and on my old blog at PW
The guy who created Spongebob Squarepants was a marine biologist. It would be great if you started a show about Jimmy Possum (done with your voice).
What would Megan’s character be called?
Piratemouth Patty
Covington Skunk Works. I appreciate your not keeping too many secrets.
Curious: how you view foot stools and their relationship to a particular chair geometry. Like to put my feet up but it definitely affects how one sits in a chair. Never seen you write about this.
I haven’t written about it. Usually footstools are used with chairs that can recline – Morris chairs, Roorkhees etc. The only footstools used with upright chairs are gout stools and small footstools that are for shorter-legged sitters.
Orkney chairs have a similar layback, although obviously wildly different in construction.
https://images.app.goo.gl/D63nqiDSeutMfJQ36
After seeing three of those chairs last year, I really want to build one.