How much is too much for a chair

[rob-stone]

This is right up my street.
Im a product designer/Design teacher at a college.
That chair is a design icon, and if made by a decent company, will not loose money. however its plain awefull to sit on and there are many more design classics to choose from.
I got some chairs i make and sell. £400 for early bay members

 

[vil]

Retro furniture, now that's the Missus' thing

She is well into her furniture and we have an Eames Shell chair in the living room which cost us £360, a lot for what it is but a worthy investment we feel. Go for it I say! But I won't be showing the Wife this thread 'cos she will want one too! :lol:

We are currently looking for a Barcelona chair for the Bedroom, the prices on those don't seem too bad

 

[jabbo]

Personally myself I'd never consider spending that much on a chair. I could buy 5 cars for that much! Also, from looking at it, it doesn't seem that complex and I reckon you could build a pretty good replica for a fraction of the cost.

That said, if it's what you want then go for it. At the end of the day you only live once so you may aswell try to have the things you want.

 

[emerald]

Hello people, not VW related but i gave up caring about that a long time ago.
So here is the story for well over a year i have been trying to find this chair called the Red and Blue chair is was designed by a guy called Gerrit Rietveld in about 1917 now i have found a company that is selling it but it costs £579 not including postage but not sure how much that costs.

add some straps and i saw a chair like that at Erotica last year


i say buy it, if you have the money to spare then why not

 

[Marvin]

Are you sure thats not the slightly rarer and equally desirable "Red and Yellow" chair....Just a thought :wink:

 

[Justin & Muttley]

...add some straps and i saw a chair like that at Erotica last year...

:shock: 8)

 

[Araon]

add some straps and i saw a chair like that at Erotica last year

I thought that had another erect addition to the seat

Errrrrr so I heard from a friend of a cousins aunties cat sitter....

 

[EgoTrippin]

Originals of these go for thousands, as do original Barcelona chairs and most other design classics. The market at the moment is flooded with copies of design classics because the original copyrights on most of them has run out.
I reckon the price is ok for a new one, as originals are museum pieces really.
The Schroeder house that Rietveld designed in Utrecht in 1924 is an astonishing piece of design.
I collected 50's and 60's furniture over the last few years, but usually at the cheaper end of the (flea) market. I've run out of room (living in a small flat ) and cash (an expensive four-wheeled design classic with a big VW badge on parked outside )
Go for it Shaggy - its a sculpture that does look really good.

 

[Shaggy]

I would love to see Mrs Schröders house she was as cool as Rietveld I will be heading that way next year in to Denmark so i might try and pop past We really want to start collecting furniture, we moved in last year and the stuff we have is ok, but we decided everytime we replace something we will do it with something we really want no matter what the cost within reason, as its best to live around things you love please we never want for much around the place. I found the plans for the red and blue chair and across the road is a furniture maker so i am gonna pop and have a word with him and see what he can do for me, I am more about the design than the make and as long as the quality is there but i mean its not a complicated piece to construct its just I don't have the tools for the finish, but It is so nice to hear about a lot of you guys who know or are interested or even just understand. THANK YOU! 8)

 

[bananacustard]

I just googled this house. It's amazing, 1924!!! How come there's so much shit, badly designed housing around now.
Always get well designed nice things, they're around you all the time and your surroundings have a big influence on you. Better to invest in a few timeless classics than surround yourself in crap (and cheaper in the long run).
Definitely do it.

 

[Shaggy]

How come there's so much shit, badly designed housing around now.

Now this question i have posed to myself many times over the last few months and my conclusion too this is today we live in a world where we need nothing everything is given or available to us at any given time, I and speaking in general terms now, but if i look at my life and life of others around me and we have it good, we are given most things in the way of a 9 to five we work we pay taxes we go and spend our money and are almost told what we will live in and what we need, which i guess has always been the way it has been, but in the general public we do not strive for something better just something that we can not afford that is already out there, now back in the 20's and even before then, science had started to give us so much and philosophy of the mind started to offer us better insight in to our own minds and ideals, now its a collection of a lot of things I guess but my belief is back then people wanted to create an ideal after the great war we hit a depression and people wanted to make a better life. ideas were rife and it was a free world to a point again, its these ideals that people wanted to create that gave us timeless design, they tried to build up a way of life through design and good well thought out design, these days we have so much and life is good that we don't really need or should i say have a need to come up with ideals and there for timeless ideals that create great design. I hope that makes sense, but opinions on this would be very welcome

 

[Cali-Bay]

Go for it dude, get it brought
We love the old furniture & totaly understand where your coming from !!

This is my computer chair, rescued from a skip at the leicester uni

This is one of the chairs from our 50s suite

Remember, you can never be out of fashion because it's never rearly in fashion.
lol..... my relatives rearly don't understand :lol:

 

[EgoTrippin]

That Bertoia chair is a good skip-find Cali-Bay. I've got a nice Robin Day polyprop armchair by Hille rescued from a skip. Just needs a jet wash and maybe some new legs and it'll look sorted

 

[Shaggy]

Sounds like i need to hunt in some skips all over europe, i feel a TV programme coming on

 

[rob-stone]

How come i cant find great stuff in skips? Believe me i have tryed!
Alot of my previous work involved readymades...making new shit out of old shit.
As for the drab housing and furniture;
I think one person can see the light but the general public are idiots. It's now too easy to go to Ikea or Habitat and buy a product marketed as 'good taste' although these types of stores do have some nice items, it takes that little more effort to find something outstanding. Your general 9-5 Ford owner is too lazy and conservative to develop their own taste and style, so therefore follow the crowd.
As for housing, we have the shittest. Since the war we have been churning out the same old crap all because the 'general public' like them. go to a housing estate in sweden/Germany/poland and its much more exciting. Icould go on....Iv written thousands of words about this kind of topic. At least its nice to see some people are still individuals, although we all own the same car!

 

[Shaggy]

we might all own the same car but i bet each is different, where as your 9-5 ford owners will all be the same, even in the same there can be individualism

 

[rob-stone]

This chair has floated my boat for a while now. Tejo Remi rag chair 1991

These are awesome too :wink:

 

[Shaggy]

I like the last one but i wouldn't want to slip :shock:

the green one is my fav thank you for sharing

 

[concrete hippo]

If you haven't already got it you all should get this book -

http://www.taschen.com/pages/en/catalogue/design/all/01874/facts.1000_chairs.htm?flash=TRUE

8)

 

[EgoTrippin]

Yeah '1000 chairs' is a definate purchase if your into chairs