Thonet Bent Ply Dining Chairs  

Lovely...
I'm a big fan of Thonet chairs. A good resource you might look at is Google's patents library, search keyword Thonet, if interested. I'm sure you can find when exactly that chair was patented.
http://www.google.com/patents

I sold
4 of those.
Personally, I would not refinish them. They are institutional chairs and I THINK should look that way. Dinged, etc. But that may just be me

I'm just going to rub them...
I'm just going to rub them with Watco rejuvenating oil.

yeah
that's what I would do. I wouldn't be surprised if you liked what you had at that point, dings etal.

Others will let me know
if I have this wrong -- but would oiling them preclude, or make more difficult, a complete refinish at some future point ?
I agree that oil, or wax, or even spit would make them look better than they do now. But I would also expect that the new "wetting" could make some of the finish defects more prominent -- such as the dark marks on the back of the second chair in the photo, where the finish has been replaced by something which has darkened the wood ?
One harmless way to assess the possible effect of oiling (or any clear finish, applied without sanding or stripping) would be to wipe on some mineral spirits (paint thinner). This will soon evaporate, but not before showing you what the chairs would look like with a new coat of just about anything -- in my limited experience.

I refinished Thonet chairs
Hi there,
We recently purchased and refinished 4 Thonet chairs, mid 50's that were made from plywood.
These had been varnished etc. stained etc many times before we got them.
I do not know the condition of your chairs or if you will keep them for personal use - but I assure you well finished they are simply fantastic - though i will add a note that the amount of work in sanding to get it down to the grain without penetrating the layer of veneer is a vast amount of work.
But the reward is there.
We were going to keep them for something else and now instead we have them in the dining room as a highlight for the room - these chairs can come out very very nice when done right.

SDR...the orange stripper cle...
SDR...the orange stripper cleaner did what you talk about mineral spirits doing.
The Watco Rejuvenating Oil won't do anything more than to enliven the tone of the wood and even out the tone of the long exposed wood(damaged finish) to the wood that still has finish on it.

Good. I guess
I was thinking about the worn-away portions of the finish, and if the oil penetration would thus be uneven and affect a later refinishing process.
They are lovely chairs, even in their present condition. Congratulations.

They're going to replace our ...
They're going to replace our MCM walnut chairs(maker not known) we presently have for our "new to us" house...built in 1961. The ones we have will be relegated to Holiday duty and thus put into the storage cove.
I will now be in search of a new dining table to replace the hideous table my Mother-in-law gave us. It needs to be small since our kitchen has enough room for a 36" round/square...a challenge.
SDR...I've used the Watco Rejuvenating Oil on quite a few pieces before and some of them have been refinished afterward. I haven't noticed any problems with the wood being oiled previously by the Watco. I think the Watco Oil isn't like a standard furniture oil I would normally use on a finished piece. The Howard's Feed-n-Wax I use is something more like what you may be thinking of. It has waxes and orange oil and is a very heavy bodied oil mixture which builds coat after coat.

That sounds good.
I guess I would stay away from anything that has a color component ? Just the "clear" version . . .
As consumers of furniture we may all be guilty of ignorance of the trouble makers go to to give us defect-free wood; knots, mineral stain, etc are virtually absent from the finished pieces, which doesn't happen by itself. As such, the material we look at is the best of each length of lumber that comes from the tree. That alone should encourage us to forgo stains of any kind and allow the wood to speak for itself ?
Not in connection with the present post -- it just occurred to me to mention this point for the general good (?).

Here they are after the Watco.
Here they are after the Watco. As you can see the one seat's finish is far worse than the others. I think they came out looking alright considering how they started.
Yeah, I didn't want to stain them or even use the Natural Watco lacquer. If I ever feel like refinishing them I would go straight Natural lacquer and let time color them.

me?
LOVE em.