what would you do?  

One of my very good frien...
One of my very good friends owns this chair and It came from the Price Tower from the estate of Caroline Price, owner of the original Price Tower, designed by Frank Lloyd wright
Wright designed these chairs for the tower and they are too cool
My friend wants to sell it to me for $20,000 and I am real close..
I would like to have the chair reproduced since he told me there is no royalty to be paid to FLW or the Price estate. as you know I have several companies and I know of one company that is a foundry that works in Aluminum . I think it would be cool to have a limited run of 50 ( better than those stupid eames elphants for 2000.00 what do you think I have no idea if i will to any thing other than purchase this rare treat.

i would
i would buy another company.
then i would have that company buy all my other companies. then i would have that behemoth company part company with me. then i would sell that massive company that chair for 1,000,000.
then i would repeat that whole scenario 50 times and then retire to a zen island located where noone wants to be. once on that island, i would swear to complete and devoted silence until the day i perish. that would be best in my opinion.
but that is just me. certainly there are other resonable solutions to your conundrum.

My guess is that it would...
My guess is that it would probably sell so I would get estimates for the costs and see if it was worth my time doing it.

I think I know the chair,...
I think I know the chair, could you post an image though?
If the costings are good...could you contact the FLW foundation or whatever it is and get some endorsement from them? Then offer them through MOMA or similar?

great idea hp
i think i ...
great idea hp
i think i will contact the FLW foundation and see if I could get a endorsement The chairs bought 18,000 to 25,000 at various auctions over the years. with one binging about 20,000 with buyer 20 percent at the last wright auction,

now we know what you do i...
now we know what you do in room 606
have you seen what is in room 506 a floor below?

Devil's advocate
I have a few concerns here. Firs of all, this chair is not overly popular. I don't know if it would sell well.
Secondly, my brother has a barber chair with a base that looks just a massive. It's absolutely dreadful to move. If this is so there are two concerns connected to the one fact.
A. Even people that know and can afford the chair may not buy it because it is hard to move. (If this is not the case tell me. It just looks heavy to me).
B. It would cost a fortune to mass produce and ship.

Doing a limited run of this...
Doing a limited run of this chair would be like taking a lesser known Mies piece and having it endorsed by the surviving Tugendhats (a percentage of the profits could go to friends of tugendhat???). I'm sure there would be a market if you took an approach like this.
If you go ahead with it you could get the stamp of approval cast into the base.

oops
oops

I think its an interesting...
I think its an interesting idea, neither good nor bad.
If its done with respect I forsee no cheesiness, indeed its the sort of project that makes design history so rich.
The FLW foundation has allways struggled finanacially from what I know, they have trouble funding the restoration of the Ennis Brwon (?) house etc , perhaps if they capitalised on the truly astounding archive they might be able to afford to keep the building fit for use, its cultural heritage afterall.

LRF I think theres some real...
LRF I think theres some real potential to bring a range of FLW works back into production, lamps, side table etc, well made and properly endorsed and marketed. I say go for it!

What to do
Maybe donate it to a design museum (Yale?) and take the tax write-off. I don't think it looks like a particularly good 'chair', just a marvellous bit of design history.

Personally I think it's an ugly chair
harsh, angular and uninviting...never thought furniture was FLW's strong suite, he could just never lighten up and do anything soft. The chair looks like a bad visit to the dentist's no matter who designed it...take room606's advice!

Thanks for your ideas
Thanks for your great ideas i loved hearing and thought about every one of your ideas.
first the chair is solid aluminum can be heavy looking but not that heavy to lift and place ( it really does look like a modern barber chair) and that crossed my mind.
Either you love love it or you just think it is o.k.
It is really considered to be one of the great designs that he did in the last 10 years of his life, when he designed the Price Tower and furniture for Price Pipeline in Bartlesville Oklahoma ,
If i could find a good caster and i would do it.
I do not want to sacrifice the chair at all by haveing to torch some of the parts to have it cast and their is only one moveable part on top, so tha would not be a problem i think,
I like the idea of the FLW foundation coming in and a portion could go for them .
Although $20,000 is a lot of money i am willing to buy the chair, if I could do something with it cause that is the way i have fun.
Now a moment for Mary ann Scott... we were wondering when you would surface again and how great of you to surface on my thread, boy am i the lucky one!! cheeeeeesy uh? well o.k. you are entitled to your opinion
just imagine how much fun YOU could have on that cool aluminum.