Adirondack chair

Adirondack chair
A typical Adirondack chair
A weathered Adirondack chair
Adirondack chair

An Adirondack chair or Muskoka chair is a type of chair favored in rural, outdoor settings. The precursor to today's Adirondack chair was designed by Thomas Lee in 1903. He was on vacation in Westport, New York, in the heart of the Adirondack Mountains, and needed outdoor chairs for his summer home. He tested the first designs on his family. The name Muskoka was adopted from the municipality of Muskoka, Ontario,[1][2] a cottage country area north of Toronto.

The original Adirondack chair was made with eleven pieces of wood, cut from a single board. It had a straight back and seat, which were set at a slant to sit better on the steep mountain inclines of the area. It also featured wide armrests, which became a hallmark of the Adirondack chair.

Today's Adirondack chairs usually feature a rounded back and contoured seat. The style has also been translated to other pieces of furniture, from gliders to love seats. Some modern Adirondack chairs are made out of plastic lumber or engineered wood instead of wood.

After arriving at a final design for the "Westport plank chair," Lee offered it to Harry Bunnell, a carpenter friend in Westport, who was in need of a winter income. Bunnell quickly realized the chair was the perfect item to sell to Westport's summer residents, and apparently without asking Lee's permission, Bunnell filed for and received patent 794,777 in 1905.[3] Bunnell manufactured his plank chairs for the next twenty years. His "Westport chairs" were all signed and made of hemlock in green or medium dark brown. The modern name refers to the Adirondack Mountains, which Westport is near.

Adirondack chairs are becoming popular as outdoor seating at cafés because the flat armrests are suitable for setting food and beverages on, making it possible to provide individual seating without tables.

They are commonly made as school projects around the world.

Adirondacking is a term used in the southern U.S. to describe public picnics at which people sit primarily in Adirondack chairs. It is also used to describe using public Adirondack-chair displays outside home-improvement and grocery stores as a leisure break while shopping.

References

  1. ^ May, Gary. "Adirondack or Muskoka chairs, what's the difference". http://www.mynewwaterfronthome.com/adirondackmuskoka.aspx. 
  2. ^ Garnett, Glenn (Winter 2001). "The Adirondack/Muskoka chair is an enduring symbol of cottage bliss". CottageLink Magazine 2 (5). http://www.cottagelink.com/magazine/archive/v2n5_s01.html. 
  3. ^ Harry C Bunnell patent no.794,777

Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем сделать НИР

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Adirondack chair — noun Etymology: Adirondack Mountains, N.Y. Date: 1945 a wooden lawn chair with a high slatted back, broad arms, and a seat that is lower in the back than the front …   New Collegiate Dictionary

  • adirondack chair — noun Usage: often capitalized A Etymology: probably so called from its popular use in the Adirondack resort area : a wooden slant back lawn chair the seat of which usually is higher at the front than at the back …   Useful english dictionary

  • Adirondack chair — a sturdy armchair for outdoor use, made of wide wooden slats, with a sloping back and a seat often slanting down toward it. * * * …   Universalium

  • Adirondack — type of lawn or deck chair (Adirondack chair is attested from 1906), said to have been designed in 1903 by Thomas Lee, owner of the Westport Mountain Spring, a resort in the Adirondack region of New York State, and commercially manufactured the… …   Etymology dictionary

  • Adirondack-Gartensessel — Der Adironak Gartensessel (engl.: Adirondack Chair) ist ein in den Vereinigten Staaten verbreiteter Gartenstuhl. Ursprung Adirondack Chair Die Heimat dieses Sessels ist in den Adirondack Mountains im US Bundesstaat New York. Er ist in den USA und …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Adirondack — notoc Adirondack may refer to: *Adirondack Mountains (New York, United States) (also known as the Adirondacks ) *Adirondack County, New York, a proposed new county in New York. *Adirondack Park, the largest state level protected area in the… …   Wikipedia

  • Adirondack Blue — Type consommation Obtenteur Robert L. Plaisted, Ken Paddock et Walter De Jong (université Cornell) Pays  États Unis Année …   Wikipédia en Français

  • X-chair — Cross framed chair in Palazzo Vecchio, Florence An X chair (also scissors chair, Dante chair, or Savonarola chair) is a chair with X shaped frame. It was known in Ancient Egypt, Rome, and Greece …   Wikipedia

  • Pomme de terre à chair colorée — Pommes de terre à chair rose Rote Emmalie …   Wikipédia en Français

  • List of chairs — The following is a partial list of chair types, with internal or external cross references about most of the chairs.0 9The 10 Downing Street Guard Chairs are two antique chairs used by guards in the early 1800s.AThe Aalto armchair 406 was… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”