Expertise needed-mission style upholstery
Quickstep
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I just bought two mission style chairs. The seat in the chair consists of a piece of plywood, with a piece of foam on top, wrapped in fabric. The plywood sits on the corner braces in the chair frame. Below the corner braces there are slats. I’ve got to believe that the original seat rested on thos slats and not the corner braces. Does anyone know enough about these chairs to tell me how this should be set up?
The chair looks like the one in the attached picture
the
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Mission-style chair design
Since an actual chair expert hasn't come along, let me offer an observation.
It may be that the upholstered plywood seat cushion may have been added to replace the worn original. The original may have been a frame, over which webbing was interlaced, and then covered with padding and the external cloth or leather cover. The slats below the seat blocks may have been intended to limit the amount of webbing sag.
Thanks, Ralph, that's sound logic. I'm wanting to be true to the original, while still maintaining some level of practicality.
A reference
As I said, I was just guessing. But, having gotten up off my "LA" since, it does appear that the webbed frame approach for a slip seat was common.
"More Shop Drawings for Craftsman Furniture" by Robert Lang (Fox Chapel publishing, Cambium Press, 2006) shows the webbed frame approach, along with other alternatives for upholstering chairs, benches, etc.
I haven't noticed any examples of the slats below the support blocks you have on your chairs, though.
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