The Roorkee family tree spreads across most of Europe.
Marcel Breuer’s “Wassily” chair (1925), Le Corbusier’s “Basculant” chair (1928), Wilhelm Bofinger’s “Farmer Chair” (1966) and Vico Magistretti’s “Armchair 905” (1964) all owe a tremendous debt to the Roorkee chair.
Two of the closest relatives are the Kaare Klint “Safari Chair” and Arne Norell’s version, now sold as the Sirocco chair by the Swedish furniture company, Norell Möbel AB.
There’s a particularly well-broken-in example in this recent Craigslist ad passed to me by Dave Jeske. The Sirocco is an interesting chair because all its components are turned, and Norell eliminated the pivoting back braces – giving the job of holding the back leather piece to the back legs. The cant of the backrest is handed by fastening the back leather to two of the turned side stretchers.
Speaking of stretchers, Norell added three of them to this chair compared to the classic Roorkee. Yet, the chair still retains the same basic profile.
In the coming months, I’ll be exploring more links between 19th-century campaign furniture and 20th-century modern design. There are, in my opinion, some strong ties.
Woodworker Philip Marshall of Fairbanks, Alaska, has made a Roorkee chair with a vernacular Alaskan twist.
Marshall, whose woodworking company is called Polhavn Woodfabrik, made the Roorkee using the same joinery principles of the 1898 original, which was designed half a world away in Roorkee, India. But instead of turned legs, Marshall used naturally shaped timbers.
I’ve seen a lot of rustic designs while judging woodworking competitions in upstate New York, but this example is quite special because it breaks down and has the leather seat. This makes it look a lot more intimate than the giant Celtic thrones you see in the Adirondacks.
Well done! Check out Marshall’s site for other similarly styled pieces here.
Mark Firley of The Furniture Record sent me some photos of a couple of high-back settles he’s encountered in his travels. One of them has a curved seat and back, like the example I showed yesterday.
But even more interesting are the photos Mark took of the joinery of the settle: Dovetails on an angle, through-tenons for the seat and a nice detail of the fantastic joint at the back where the backboards meet.
It’s almost enough visual information for me to build the settle. But sadly, I’ll have to travel to England to complete my research on this and other pieces.
Several weeks ago I commented on a stick that changed my workshop habits. I have posted a video and explanation of that stick on my blog at Popular Woodworking Magazine.
Though I haven’t been writing much about it, work has continued on my next book, “The Furniture of Necessity.” It’s still too far away to predict its publication date, but things are falling into place to make a type of book that hasn’t been seen in a long time.
Here are some recent waypoints.
1. An Engraver. I have found a copperplate engraver who will make the plates for “The Furniture of Necessity.” She works in a very traditional manner. This book will be a partnership between her and me, so expect some eye-opening illustrations.
2. Thanks to Suzanne “Saucy Indexer” Ellison, the research for the book has been forging ahead. She has been collecting the limited literature on these forms, which I have been reading for many months now on long flights and in hotel rooms. Without Suzanne’s help, I’d be a year behind on this book.
3. Projects. I’ve been sorting through some of the projects I want to discuss and build for “The Furniture of Necessity.” Today I was looking at some of the English pieces I selected from a 1982 exhibit at the Stable Court Galleries at Temple Newsam. Suzanne dug up the hard-to-find exhibit catalog for me.
Here are a few of the forms that are finalists for the book.
Welsh Stick-back Chair (shown above)
I call this chair the “Cwm Tudu” chair because that was the area where the chair was found in Cardiganshire. (And because I have no idea if I’m pronouncing “Cwm Tudu” correctly, it’s fun to botch.) This chair has an elm seat. The arm bow is a naturally curved branch. And guests won’t be able to tip backward in it.
Countrey Stoole
Illustrated in Randle Holme’s “Academy of Armory,” this particular example was allegedly owned by Anne Cotton, the West Auckland murderess. These stools were used for everything from milking a cow to resting your feet.
Farmhouse Settle
The high-backed settles of England are one of my favorite forms. I particularly like the ones with a curved seat and back, such as this early 19th-century example. Ealier examples tended to have backboards of random widths.
Lodging Box
These very common boxes were used by every youth leaving home to go into domestic service. Most had a till for storing small objects. The boxes were commonly dovetailed and used for a variety of purposes in a household.
Drinking Table
A common three-legged table, usually painted white or left in the white. The three legs made it stable on uneven floors. This example is dated 1821, though this form is quite older.
