and gigantic couches last year, the company spin was that Mirasol filled a need created by ever-bigger houses. A savvy consumer might have answered justifiably, "Bigger houses, my ass." "To Americans, the 12-inch-round stool won't work anymore -- now it's 18 inches," says Jeff Singleton, partner in wildly successful Groovystuff, which reclaims wood in Thailand to make mostly outdoor furniture for U.
S. buyers. "Call it the bum factor.
American butts are big." No buts about it, American furniture makers want to coddle the American behind, and that means wider, deeper, cushier seating to suit the greatest common denominator. Last year, Harden introduced a dining chair by esteemed declared it "too narrow for Americans," said company publicist Leslie Newby.
Mission dining chairs for Harden this fall, giving them 19 1/2 inches across the seat. may leave something to be desired for the rest of the marketplace, furniture "I don't know of anybody who's gone into a furniture store and said, 'That's an ugly chair, but it's so comfortable I have to have it,' " said Pulaski Vice President Jim Kelly. "A chair made for McDonald's has been totally tested and is ergonomically perfect.
But when you deal with fashion, you're never going to sell it unless it's pretty." Indeed, furniture experts say a piece of furniture has to be easy on our eyes before we even bother to test its effect on our bottoms. Michael Pierce, merchandising director for San Francisco's Zocalo, says the American consumer typically gives a piece of furniture a six-second test.
"First thing is, see it and like it," Pierce said. "Next, they walk up and look at the price tag. If that's OK, then they sit down.
" Not necessarily for long, though. "I see people here at the market sit like this," said La-Z-Boy product manager of upholstery Penny Eudy, perching ever so briefly at the edge of a chair, "and get up saying, 'Nope.' " Under the circumstances, one might think the furniture makers have formulated some scientific calculations for comfort.
La-Z-Boy -- known for average, average, taller for the men and then the same for women," Eudy said. series of chairs, which have a capacity of as much as 500 pounds. It also has a firm seat option in some of its chairs.
Flexsteel's Mountain, PeopLoungers' Big Deal, Franklin's Manhandler and Best Home Furnishings' Beast. Seats on the latter two chairs measure 22 inches across, a nod to expanding obesity statistics over the past 20 years. But that's about as scientific as it gets.
The Groovystuff partners used to be engineers, but there's absolutely nothing calculated about what they're doing with reclaimed trees and farm machinery. Singleton said that designer Chris Bruning "uses chain saw, chisel and hammer" on its uncomfortable-looking tree-trunk chairs, "carving it down and sitting in it until it feels right." because "people can move around and find a position that suits them.
" However, Bruning acknowledged, "it's not always easy to make reclaimed In between industry giant La-Z-Boy and newcomer Groovystuff, most prototype and evaluate its comfort. "We bring in a chair and have all of us sit in it," said Lisa Frudden, marketing director for Richmond's Palecek. "Every chair we make, we concentrate on the pitch.
If it's a lounge chair, you want the pitch to go back. If it's a dining chair, you want it to go forward, so that you're not using every stomach muscle to keep yourself at the table. With leather, if the pitch isn't right, you slip in it.
If a chair is too low, it's really hard to get out of." There are, of course, certain industry standards -- the 30-inch-high dining table, the 18- to 19-inch-high dining chair. Kelly said some Pulaski was too short, they said.
Well, it was only half an inch too short." After the High Point Market, he planned to bring the height up to a level that's comfortable because it's typical. After that, though, the consumer has lots of variables to consider.
sitter and abrasive on the table. Pitch isn't standard, either -- too far back is useless for dining, too far forward suggests that the sitter not use the back at all. At Century, a collection called Game Chairs features an you lean back -- but when you play a game you lean forward, so these backs can be more stylish than comfortable.
It's OK for some chairs to be mere eye candy. During an unscientific survey of seats at the fall furniture market in High Point, N.C.
, passers-by that chair." Once was over a sky blue loveseat at Century that was extremely comfy, but the other time the tester could feel the wooden rings of Palecek's Simone chair poking her in the back. The glossy, black bent-wood Simone chair was so beautiful, however, that it could easily find its way into a corner somewhere, maybe more as art than furniture.
One could always seat an unwanted guest there and hope for a short "It's kind of risky, but we decided to bring it to market without a cushion on the back," Frudden said. "This is a good example of fashion taking "You wouldn't want to watch 'Gone With the Wind' in it," said a sales rep strolling by. "But you look really good in it.
" The same unscientific survey, taken by sitting in hundreds of seats, furniture that fits them. "My mother never sat in furniture before she bought it," said La-Z-Boy spokeswoman Emily Shirden. "So I grew up with some of the can get in and out of a chair, physically disparate couples who want a couch to Have furniture made to order.
Woodworker Michael Singer threw a party, made all of his friends stand against the wall, traced the curves of their can adjust, which is the nice thing about custom chairs." Singer suggests that that fit his "average person" parameters. The his-and-hers concept also works in recliners.
Eudy says La-Z-Boy's more compact "pressback" models, which don't have handles on the side, appeal to women. Use throw pillows. It's no coincidence that they have moved to the forefront in recent years; as furniture seats have deepened, throw pillows are people who don't have long legs.
These work for dining chairs too. Take advantage of furniture manufacturers' efforts to be people pleasers. Palecek, for instance, brought to market a lounge chair in its rattan cane Dunhill line and offered it in two sizes -- the Grand Lounge Chair, at 37 inches wide, 36 inches deep and 45 inches high, and the Lounge chair, 31 1/2 inches wide, 35 inches deep and 40 inches high.
It'll be interesting to watch the sales figures, but it might be that the choice. When editors of a shelter magazine toured Palecek's latest offerings, Frudden said, "The chairs that I showed them that they liked were the smaller ones.
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