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#	Post Title	Result Info	Date	User	Forum
	Yes on the foam thicknesses.	1 Relevance	11 years ago	Spanky	General discussion
	Yes on the foam thicknesses. I get the screw caps off by sliding a thin, flat blade under the very edge, making sure to keep it flat against the chair frame so that it doesn't scratch the frame, and then just work the button out very, very gradually. If you do get any scuffs on the frame, they will disappear with oiling. A mat cutter blade is ideal but anything like that will do. A box cutter blade might be good (not in the knife, though). Leif, have you redone these in leather? I know the cardboard backs were originally glued on but my first attempt at that was such a horrible experience that I gave up and have been sewing them on ever since. I used contact cement and brushed it on to both surfaces but that stuff is so viscous and goopy that it ended up getting where i didn't want it to, even though I was being super careful! It was only a few drops here and there but it was a horrible, messy experience that I never want to repeat. (Plus, fumes---that was before i got a respirator. Duh.) Some of the contact cement started losing its grip after a few years, too. That was really disheartening because i thought that stuff was really, truly permanent. I think the originals had to have been done with rigid masks that clamped onto the chair backs. The cardboard piece was less of a problem. Anyway, now I cut the fabric for the cardboard backing, notch the corners to get rid of bulk, lay it right side down on a sheet of paper (using a new sheet for each backing piece) with the cardboard backing in place, and apply spray adhesive. I move the cardboard about 1/4" off center in each direction as do the sides so that there's a 1/4" perimeter of fabric that has no glue on it. This is because sewing through adhesive is very difficult. Then I fold the fabric over onto the cardboard, let it dry, and tack it to the chair back with a half-in staple near each corner. Then sew in place with a ladder stitch. Gluing the whole thing would be quicker but I know that the stitching will hold forever and it's what I'm most comfortable doing.
	I just refinished two of	1 Relevance	9 years ago	Salleira	Repair
	I just refinished two of these chairs. They were in the original walnut finish and then painted a glossy black when the original owner got "tired" of the walnut. So, first thing is that they come apart, which makes it much easier to refinish them. There should be a couple screws in the seat, and once those are removed the arms, back, seat, and a couple other parts have keyholes that allow you to disassemble. I can take photos when I get home tonight to show you an example, though there may be some on the boards. Second, if you choose to refinish them, they are solid wood and not veneer. So you can use a random orbital sander on most areas (100 grit or 150 grit) and then hand sand the other areas. The spindles are a giant pain in the ass and my husband used a mini belt sander to do them, which worked quite well. Third, they are made from beech, which is known to be a blotchy wood that takes stains unevenly. There are a ton of opinions on how to deal with this issue, but I found this video from the Wood Whisperer very useful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwgaADLr9w We followed this technique (1:1 shellac to alcohol) and then used General Finishes Gel-Stain in Antique Walnut. It went on pretty flawlessly (couple places needed some touch up, but nothing awful). Now we're in the process of spray lacquering the various parts and we'll then reassemble. Just to be clear, refinishing these chairs has taken a while. I don't regret it, but it was a lot of work. If you only have areas where the lacquer is flaking, you may be able to do your own spot repairs. Lacquer is designed to sort of melt into itself and bond, which makes it one of the most friendly finishes for spot repairs. The only issue I see if you choose to do that is that it is a toned lacquer finish. So if you cannot match the tone in the original lacquer, you're going to have color differences and it will be really obvious. Good luck!
	Water Bottles	1 Relevance	15 years ago	TinyArmada	General discussion
	Water Bottles I would never have a cat declawed and can't even imagine the blood that would flow if I tried to subject my cat to claw covers. What's worked for me - yelling "NO" like the earth is about to end at kitty when she tries to scratch your nice furniture - then while kitty is still in stunned shock at your sudden pits of hell yell, walk over to their scratching pad and lovingly coach them to have there way with it. It's worked well for me, after my cat attempts to scratch my furniture and I then go over and scratch on her cardboard pads, she always walks over and scratches the hell out of the cardoard like a good kitty. If the yelling doesn't work, the water bottle will. Just keep a handy spray bottle by your side, any time kitty tries to scratch yell "no" and spray with some water. It will get to the point merely reaching for the bottle will do the job. My kitty's attempts at shredding my dux couch have been reduced to a mere attempt or two a month and its not really because she wants to scratch it but because she damn well knows that's a sure fire way to get my attention if nothing else will. The only thing I should add is my kitty does get to go romp outside when she pleases (has nice woods to play and hunt in) so she gets out a lot of her energy and scratching behavior there. When I first had her and tried to keep in her indoors that bottled up energy was harder to contain in positive ways. (Also there tends to be more problems with cats that are cooped up alone all day in small apartments. If your cat is spending lots of times without you in the apartment sometimes the scratching is an aggressive way of telling you they need more love and attention.) Also, very important, to make sure you have a real scratching pad that they actually like and use. I've had no success with those pole things or carpet pads. However the boxes with the sides of cardboard strips in them - I've never met a cat that didn't love those and use them regularly. Kitties have to scratch and keep their claws filed - so its absolutely necessary to provide them with an outlet. (No outlet, means your furniture is cruising for a bruising.)
	HI Koen...	1 Relevance	19 years ago	Olive	General discussion
	HI Koen... I'm Olive's sister, I'm not sure I can answer all your question but I'll try. As my sister said, I have a small zoo... 2-legged and 4. I have had this Dyson for nearly 5 years (Mother's Day 2004) and it has suffered many indignities in that time span. I have just turned it over to have a good look at the main brush head it has little to no degradation in the bristles themselves and despite the shredded hair ribbon and the 'My Little Pony' toy hair throttling the spinner it continues to spin freely. All of the other brushes look just as good and the connections still snap tightly together. The tubes are all fine. The removable dust bin is intrinsically easy and still fits properly and has no loosness to it. The upholstery thingy is a gift of gold and it has probably removed enough animal hair from my sofas to amply re-fur a pride of lions. The only thing that ever broke was one connection area after it took a trip down the stairs by itself (I say 'by itself' but it was actually assisted by a 4 y.o. boy who said he was; and I quote "playing with gravity"). I called Dyson and had the part in 2 days and, needing no other tool but my hands, replaced the part in under a minute. It's tougher than any vacuum I have ever used and I am pretty sure you can suck the whole cat up off the first floor when you are vacumming on the second floor. OK that's the good news, here are the few things I don't like... The power switch is almost too easy to hit and I turn it on and off unintentionally. Switching it to the wand attachment takes a few times to get the hang of, when I first got it, I stared at it with my mouth open for a few minutes before I finally had to read the manual, but I also think this has changed in later generations of the machine. The last bit may be just me and my zoo but cleaning the filter out by banging it on the railing outside is probably not the optimal solutional, although effective. It does give you a glimpse as to how tough even the insides are, though. There may be a few people who have worked their machines harder but I bet I'm in the top 10%. I would recommend this machine to any one who asked. Hope this helps
	One more add about this LRF	1 Relevance	19 years ago	dcwilson	General discussion
	One more add about this LRF People forget Hollywood is a big industry town, the movie equivalent of a Detroit in cars, or a silicon valley in tech. As such it has a huge number of persons with in it with lots of money. And as with any industry town, it becomes interested in its own heritage eventually and up and coming persons and the elders both seek to hold onto parts of that heritage themselves, that has been lost as the industry town continues to evolve. Hollywood people since the decline of the studios have looked back longingly at the lost glamor of the old Hollywood and try to recover and preseve bits and pieces of it in many ways. Buying up the old artifacts of the old designers that served this glamorous age of Hollywood is one of the ways that it is done. This is sort of a long winded way of saying that today's Hollywooders themeselves have sufficient wealth to bid up this sort of thing to astronomical prices even if the rest of the modernist afficionados of the world could care less about it. Laszlo and the other Hollywood designers you mention might also be related to a fashion designer like Don Loper, though I think for the most part they are better at furniture than Don Loper was at clothes. But regardless of how interesting of a subculture Hollywood was and still is, our focus on Paul Laszlo and his Hollywood peer designers should still try to get behind the image and get to the furniture and evaluate: how good was it? Koen, are you out there? I could use some help on this one. The Belgian mastercraftsman in you will probably bridle a bit at taking the time to think about this tiny group of designers from Hollywood, but I think Mr. Laszlo might provoke some interesting insights in you nonetheless...even if you don't like his work, which I suspect you will not. He's just not elegant enough in terms of his solutions is my guess as to what Koen will say. But who knows? The kid from Antwerp always surprises me with what his learned eyes can pull from the innards of a design. Regardless, LRF, thank you for a lively and informative exchange on this subject.
	RE: Is this Sibast ?	1 Relevance	6 years ago	mvc	Identification
	@leif-ericson Zephyr, you are not the first who is trying desperately to shed light on the darkness, and you will not be the last to fail. You always like to talk about the fact that everything has to be viewed in the context of the time and circumstances of that time, and of course that is correct, so you should actually be aware that it was just normal people at that time, completely normal people with weaknesses and faults like everyone of us.The gadfly Aaronny once wrote something about it which was absolutely correct, but nobody wanted to hear it because it was the gadfly Aaronny who wrote it. Back then, none of the catalog editors thought that everything had to be exactly correct, only to serve some design enthusiasts who are racking 50 years later their brains about who designed exactly what furniture. Apart from a few real artists like Wegner, Juhl and Jacobsen - and a few others, who you will no doubt mention in a protest - the drafts of Scandinavian design were geared towards inexpensive mass production, and outside of Denmark/Scandinavia no one was interested in knowing more about the detailed background of a furniture, the main thing was that it came from Scandinavia.If even the Danish Design Museum can only show an incomplete and faulty archive, then you must not presume to want to know better just because you have thousands of catalogs at home.Incidentally, most of the designers at the time were alcoholics, they drank and whored as much as they could, and of course one of them copied from the other and then, drunk, claims it was his design, that's how it happened in artistic circles you don't know about, and the editors of catalogs and magazines were usually just as drunk.It was like that back then, Zephyr, you mustn't confuse the living conditions at that time with the sterile, puritanical, political correctness mentality of today, everything was allowed at that time, it didn't matter if mistakes were made or not.So, dear Zephyr, keep racking your brain over a subject you will never clear up, but be careful not to turn it into an obsession.
	my latest find......	1 Relevance	16 years ago	luluhotrod	General discussion
	I wanted to share my latest find. I'm sure this will ruffle a few feathers because this is a cheaply made, mass produced, plastic chair, and also because there are some who will believe it is a knock-off. I saw these at a rummage sale, i was about twenty feet away and my brain screamed out at the bucket seat hiding in a pile in a corner. I hurried over and at first i was a little disappointed that they were not eames chairs, but as i took a closer look, i realized they were like nothing i had ever seen before. I asked the gentleman who was sizing me up, how much they were, and he said 'i got 4 of em, but they aren't originals, you want em all? You can have em all for 10 bucks.' I snapped them up and took them home. I searched online a little, but could not find any chairs that matched and i did not give it much more thought. I had considered posting an ID thread on here, but i had some other chairs i wanted to ID first and i didn't want to post two ID's at once. The other night i stumbled across the information i was seeking. The chair was designed by Sam Avedon in 1962 for Alladin Plastics. I should mention that i own an eames shell chair, and these chairs are far more comfortable. I can't quite describe what it is that makes them so, maybe they shape of the bucket seat, or the fact that the seat has a considerable amount of flex to it, but all of my guests have commented the same thing. I am curious as to what everyone else thinks. http://deluxanyc.blogspot.com/2010/02/sam-avedon-chair.html
	Fleamarket find: Pierre Paulin for Thonet?	1 Relevance	15 years ago	brakkepie	General discussion
	Hi all, a couple of weeks ago I came across this chair on a local fleamarket. Not knowing who designed it or who made it, other than the info on the back mark, I managed to get it for 17 euros and walked away with a smile. Once home I started looking for some more info based on said back mark. I found out Sicre Jeune still exists and I was stoked to find out some of the history of the company. Thing is though, I had this nagging feeling I had seen this chair before. It reminded me of some of Pierre Paulins' designs and after little research I found some people selling my exact chair as a armchair version of the CM 190. The plaque on the back could be a giveaway that Sicre Jeune actually made this chair. However it says "installateur" which could mean they just sold furniture and decorated... I did ask them but no reply. Did stores in the past attach their name to furniture they would sell and "install" even if it wasn't their design? I've seen three slightly different designs being sold as being a Thonet cm 190 armchair version. What should I be able to find if this is a real one? Did Thonet change the design over the years? Anyone with an old catalogue that could help? thanks for your help
	Ouch	1 Relevance	14 years ago	Buck Rogers	General discussion
	Ouch There is a theme running it would seem that people asking for attributions on amazing items (such as this bold claim of a prototype) are "making it up", which is not always true, but sometimes it is. I have to find it incredulous that with as much information as you had in the first place about the chair, that rather than researching locally directly with the family & friends who apparently could have been located to verify the story as you knew the lady, who could have given names of the family, and friends who were executives at HM, that you instead would come onto this forum instead. Asking if a certain chair or item is the work of this person or that person etc. is one thing, but to seriously ask people on a design forum if this chair is a prototype of a DCM - one of the most well documented chairs one could ever get seems far fetched with genuine prototypes going for god-forsaken sums and being rightly in the realm of true experts to confirm...you come here. A prototype is a pretty amazing item for any designer, but a DCM from the Eames...that's just too much. I can understand people with so-so items getting an anonymous expert to say "yes, it is" and then you running with it, but this item you are talking about is another realm of identification entirely. A P-R-O-T-O-T-Y-P-E. If someone by oft chance had said "Oh yeah, looks like a prototype to me..." what would have been your next step? If it was the step that would have to have been done which would have been researching it with the leads you already had, then I guess there was no real need to come onto here with it in the first place. Seeing as the person you purchased it from knew the entire prototype story, and was totally 100% sure, I mean, who would make a up a lie about their own dead family, right? I imagine you must be out of pocket no less than well over a $2,000 as no one in their right mind with such a certainty on such a story would EVER let a prototype of a DCM go cheap. It must have struck you as your lucky day to be so lucky that she was willing to give it up at an Estate sale and not just call Wright or Rago to come pick it up. Oh no, I won't call you a liar...but how about a follow up post when you tell us all on this forum the stern words you had with the seller who gave FIRST HAND attribution statements to you and took you for a ride for THOUSANDS of dollars. Let us know how that story unfolds if you do not mind.
	Dear Mr. Wegner...	1 Relevance	20 years ago	dcwilson	General discussion
	Dear Mr. Wegner... If I have learned one thing on this site, it is that designers like to earn the respect of their peers for good work on one hand, and need occassionally to know that their good work is not just used, but affectionately appreciated by human beings that their designs were created for. They don't make a habit of saying this, but every once in awhile they let it slip. I suspect that if I had had the privilege of knowing you, you too would have let it slip eventually. The paragons of every field have, behind their many personas, a human face and human heart. Well, Mr. Wegner, I am one of those human beings you might have let slip about. Your designs fill me with wonder. They rekindle in me a sense of my own humanity. And I just plain feel exhilarated looking at some of them. This response is neither philosophical, nor academically abstract, Mr. Wegner. It is a real feeling I get in my heart and mind when I see your work. Your death draws me to only one reasonable conclusion. God needs a new throne and he wants something splendidly elegant and breathtakingly unexpected, something that the living and the dead can point to and say, there, that's what God had in mind for us when God shared his gift of creativity with them; not half-baked ideas; not trendy mendacities; not microwave crowd control weapons, mini-nukes and torture apparatus, but magnificient, useful things made wisely and with a compassion and respect for every human being. We live in a time, Mr. Wegner, as I suspect you knew all too well, when there is an unusually wide chasm between the brilliance your work shows us we are capable of and the barbarism we have allowed our world to descend to. Your designs may inspire designers to design better things and that would be all to the good, Mr. Wegner, but hear me where ever you are: your designs will remind me, and I suspect many others, in a concrete way, and for years to come, that human beings never have to, in deed, ought never to, settle for barbarism as a norm. Best wishes always, dcwilson
	Excellent idea, James. I've...	1 Relevance	20 years ago	sharplinesoldtimes	General discussion
	Excellent idea, James. I've... Excellent idea, James. I've followed this great thread closely and I have a few points that I would like to share. There's something about the wavy elements and their combined triangular shape that bothers me. Perhaps because circles goes better together with squares than triangles. I would love to see a small model with 4 elements and a square glass top with rounded corners. In my mind it just seems more balanced and harmonic. I think that the first blocky model had a very good thing going on with the 90 degree edges, because the higher end of each element seemed to rest on the next element's lower end much than after you made them round. It just seemed more stable, more natural as this is how it would look if you really found such three elements and chose to play a little with them. But Koen's right when he says that the "small triangular shapes left on the intersection of two elements are too small and out of scale". So why not making each element say 5-10 cm. longer at each straight end (as SDR also mentioned)? It would make the piece much more dramatic to look at, I think. It's important to try all options which can be done quite easily with this design. But regarding the wavy elements and triangular shape, you could loosen it up by making each element curve slightly outwards from the center. It would certainly strengthen the impression of rotation, if that's what you going for. And last, I think you should try seperating the elements' sides from the edges by fx. making the elements of plywood and then laminate only the sides with black, semi-glossy something (like HM's LTR tables by Eames) and let the lacquered edges show the different layers of plywood. I think it would add another visual dimension to the design by letting the sides and edges be different but still co-exist in contrast to each other. You would notice the shape and direction of each element more clearly. What's so good about the design behind your table, James, is that it's relative easy to really keep it simple yet in a complicated but precise way. This is the secret behind all good design. So please keep on developing this table and show us know how it goes.
	pt. 2	1 Relevance	19 years ago	dcwilson	General discussion
	pt. 2 The digital age makes such a repository with broad access quite feasible. And designers have nothing to fear from it, because it is in the orchestration of the rules, and in the building on them, that the value contribution (and indispensbility) of a designer remains. If anything, the awareness such a repository would create, particularly among producers, would alert producers to just what they are giving up when they hire a highly branded, auteur designer to produce a design that ignores all the rules, or merely copies them and so produces a product with the shelf life of a quantum particle. And of course, Consumer Reports would jump on this accrued design knowledge data base as criteria for product reviews and then not only would producers be gate keepers, but consumers would be, too. And when an informed market of buyers acts it is a HUGE driver of purposeful change. And a demand for purposeful incremental improvement spikes demand for designers. Ignorant buyers, on the other hand, make for purposeless change aka stealing from suckers. Who needs real designers to steal from suckers? We are all in this together, if we want a truly progressive society with truly progressive design. Producers need to know what works. Designers need to know what works. Consumers need to know what works. Oligarchs need to know what works. We need enlightened oligarchs, for the oligarchs we will always have with us. The enlightened oligarch is not an aristocrate with the hubris to make new rules about things he doesn't understand, because he can, but rather one who plays wise rules to his perpetual advantage because he is smart enough to know that being transgenerationally rich is a legacy thing and only marginally related to his brilliance. When all of these players know the accrued knowledge of what works, progress becomes like a juggernaut that no one player can obstruct for his narrow self interest, at least for long.
	RE: DA old timers	1 Relevance	7 years ago	SDR	Off topic
	Huh. Well, first of all I've never seen this piece; I love it. A unique way to create handles ? Is the liner fixed permanently---maybe with some insulation behind it ? I like the wax idea---removable, when this is the last one on Earth and some persnickety preservationist decides to "restore it correctly," whatever that might mean . . . I alway expect to see more black in wenge, but maybe there are varieties ? I didn't know the Danish used it, but that just tells you I'm no Skandinavian woodworking maven---not by a long shot. Glad you found and rescued this piece ! I really like it. What does the lid look like ? Can you find a photo ? I'm making a built-in desk/table/seat for my neighbor the muralist. He told me what he wanted, and I'm pursuing it. The stationary piece(s) are in; next is the movable bit, an extension of the desk into the kitchen, where it can be table height or drops down to become a bench---all, John's idea. His studio, on the opposite side of the building from mine, has an unobstructed eastern view of the city. He wanted raw light-colored wood; I used maple ply with poplar for the edge/beam. He'll coat it eventually. The orange grommets ventilate a radiator immediately beneath. The only color grommets I could easily find (meaning, Amazon) besides black or white was a pale orange---his favorite among the rainbow of colors he uses. He drives an orange Golf. His apartment has been repainted dozens of times . . . (Is there still a "Last thing you made" thread ?) Attachment: JBdeskPlan.jpg
	fair trade	1 Relevance	22 years ago	420	General discussion
	fair trade I consider the chair a fair trade to my obesity, clogged arteries, and hypertension that my love affair with Big Macs, french fries, and Oreo McFlurrys has caused me over the years. On some days, I'll even break down and get the Double Quarter pounder meal when I could just as easily get the same effect much cheaper from getting two double cheeseburgers off the value menu. And all the times I've ordered Supersize combos and wondered why those don't come with any cool toy or in a box with games and puzzles on it. I could probably catch a couple hundred dollars selling this chair on eBay. And I can bet you that I'd treat myself to a Number Four with extra ketchup with part of that money. Twice. As for the employee who gets $5.15 an hour with no health insurance, well, maybe we should talk to the CEO and see how much interest alone he's earned in one of his savings accounts. It would probably be enough to pay his employees a dollar more for their next ten paychecks and maybe a Barcelona chair (Knoll, not reproduction) for every district manager at Christmas. But don't blame me, I voted for the guy who wanted to increase minimum wage. In the end, as I drove away and was immediately caught in a stoplight 200 feet away (where at that point they certainly had the chance to stop methen if they really wanted to), I did look in my rear view mirror at the two employees and they were laughing and cracking up, high fiving each other, screaming "you GO girl!",going all game show on me, I think they had other things that worried them more. They seemed quite amused at the situation. I go to McDonalds often enough to know that Managers and employees wear different shirts, you know, the whole hierarchy thing. It was a manager and an employee who had run after me, and it seemed the manager was having the harder time of the two containing herself. So, as I sit back and admire my little golden yellow Saarinen chair,I dip another "all white meat" mcnugget into some sweet & sour sauce, I could only think of my chair's previous life where it was unloved and under-appreciated.
	RE: Finn Juhl for Søren Willadsen	1 Relevance	5 years ago	leif ericson - Zephyr Renner	General discussion
	Okay, one last thing: many of Finn Juhl’s most famous designs for ‘Bovirke’ were actually designed for Carl Brørup, and sold at his stores Bovirke and Nyt Hjem and wholesaled to some other danish furniture stores around the country. This was in the ear from 1946 to 1951 when FJ designed famous things like the BO59 lounge chair, the BO66 ‘eye table’ or the BO63 side chair and BO68 dining table, or the Bo72 armchair, or the BO55 sofa. These designs are so scarce in the documentation from then that I think this is the first time the BO66 and BO68 have ever even been given their BO model numbers in public. And bear in mind BO was the second producer of them, so their real model numbers are entirely unknown and possibly forever, but if they followed the danish usual practices they would have been referred to as CB-XX and likely the numbers I referenced were the originals, but we don’t have any documentation to support that guess. The point is that there were a lot of other designs made/produced by Carl Brørup in that era that are the very hardest to find documentation on. Willadsen advertised more than Carl Brørup. Many of those Carl Brørup pieces must have sat in the showrooms at this Bovirke and Nyt Hjem stores and when they didn’t sell they just disappeared. I have one such piece which is a sewing box that ended up in the estate of Poul Lund who was the sales manager at the Bovirke store back then and interestingly based on construction I would say it was made in Willadsen’s shop. But the point is that these pieces were only for the fairly well off urbanites of Copenhagen so they didn’t earn press like the pieces for the ultra wealthy nor did they have a big domestic market via trade journal advertising to furniture stores in the provinces. These pieces are truly the least well documented.