Charles, Ray and Wille

Both Martin and I enjoy good design but since we don't have a lot of money we tend to decorate our home quite thriftily in what could be called dumpster design.

Once in a while though we splurge. This usually happens after the tax return in June. Our major splurges so far have been the Miele fridge and six Philippe Starck Toy chairs.

Wille spends quite a lot of time by his computer and expressed a while back that he'd like a proper office chair with wheels and swivel action. I researched and googled and came to the conclusion that most office chairs are plain ugly. IKEA has a couple of ok looking ones but I don't really want to bring any that obvious IKEA pieces into our home.

While googeling I came upon one of my favourite chairs, the Eames plastic armchair and realised I didn't know it comes with wheels! I have to say I still prefer the rocking, eiffel or wooden bases but the shell being so nice I can live with the wheely base. And besides, it's going into Wille's room and he specified wheels.

The cool thing is that Wille is getting more interested in design. We have a miniature chair collection and also a book on chair design and I love that he knows the Tulip from the Pastille and that he is really pleased to get a designer chair instead of an IKEA one. I'm hoping that in addition to giving him a great comfortable office chair it will spark his interest in design even more.

   

Comments

[Anna @ D16]

Oh, congratulations on your first shell chair! My first one was white, too. :) Be careful, though, they're like potato chips. I think I have about 20 of them now, and no place to put them all! (They are easy to find old/used/cheap in the US.)

Also, good for you introducing Wille to great design. Have you shown him other work by Charles and Ray? They did so much that is appealing to children AND adults, it's all so accessible and engaging. I think you need a Hang-It-All next! :)

[Benita]

I'd love to get a vintage set of the armless ones for the dining table, but unfortunately they are not cheap or easiliy accessible here unless you buy the new ones :(. My other Eames fave is the La Chaise...
The Hang It All is really nice too. I can totally imagine one here somewhere!

[Anna @ D16]

If overseas shipping weren't so expensive, I would send you a set!

[Allison aka HaselBride]

You might be the coolest mom ever. I love it.

[Shannon]

I originally hale from Zeeland, MI, USA (home of Herman Miller), and you would not believe how many of this style chairs are sitting around in people's basements in that area. It wasn't until I started getting into design blogs that I realized they had some value. Growing up, they were just those "outdated chairs in everyone's basements." Little did I know!

[C.E.R.]

I've been meaning to ask you where o where you found the miniature chairs??? I'm a bit of a chair lover myself. :)

[Lindzi]

Maj gadd! 3100 för en kontorstol? Eller har jag helt missuppfattat? OJ! Men den var fin.

[Benita]

Wow, Anna, I might just take you up on that. It 's probably still cheaper than to buy a set over here :)

C.E.R, I got some on Ebay and some from Hong Kong. The white one is from West Elm. Some museums with design exhibitions sell them too I've noticed, like the VA in London, England.

Lindzi, det är värre än så. Snurrversionen med hjul kostar 5600. Men till mitt försvar så kostar alla andra möblerna hemma bara hundralappar så om man slår ut det... :) Ibland vill man bara ha och får stå ut med hålet i plånkan efteråt... Det är ju en designklassiker och det var pengar tillbaka från skatten så det känns värt det.

[Lindzi]

Det gjorde ni rätt i! Förstår om Wille är lycklig nu!

[Laura Long]

I found mine in a used furniture store....Love your blog by the way.

[HM]

I realize that this is very old, but I hope you also got him a plastic mat to protect the floor from the wheels. IKEA has one called Kolon.

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

HM, I made sure the wheels where the type for hard floors as opposed to the ones for carpet. Seem to work ok.