I’ve never offered chairs for sale at a discount, but I find myself drowning in chairs. Many were built in classes, both online and in-person, while others I made by accident. I am offering a discount on them for the month of November (except for the last chair, but I think you’ll understand why when you see it). I can ship them anywhere in the US. Details below:
Comb Back Arm Chair: I made a mistake. The customer told me he wanted tapered baluster legs on his chair and I made my normal comb back with Philadelphia baluster legs. I found this out two days ago and have since made all the parts for a new one, this time with the right feet. The chair currently has three coats of the red base coat that goes under a black-over-red finish, so it can be black-over-red or just barn red. $2100 (usually $2600) SOLD
I made this chair in a class a couple years ago and we’ve had it at our table since then. I used the worst bow in the pile and it’s got a slight dip at the very center where you’d like it to go up. You might not notice it, but I do. $2500 (usually $3000) SOLD
I this Democratic Chair in the online class Curtis Buchanan and I did last year. The seat was carved at Roy Underhill’s shop because my internet went out. The internet was still out the next week, so I assembled the undercarriage there too. Something went terribly wrong (you can watch the video to find out – I don’t remember), so tried again at home between classes (you can watch that too). It’s a perfectly sound chair, but it has some cosmetic issues – a crack in the spindle deck being the most noticeable. $1000 (usually $1400) SOLD
I have two of these Velda’s Arm chairs. One is walnut, hickory and butternut like the one pictured. I don’t remember why I have it. It has hung in the shop for a few years, awaiting it’s shellac. The other is white oak with a butternut seat and I built it in the Velda’s online class series I did with Curtis Buchanan this spring. $2700 each (usually $3000) SOLD
I don’t have the right photo, so this one will have to do. I build a Velda’s rocker in the class with Curtis and painted one coat of red on everything except the seat during the last class, intending to paint it black-over-red, leaving the butternut seat showing through. It’s still in that stage, waiting for me to “get around to it”. $2900 (usually $3300) SOLD
Comb back rocker
The week the pandemic started, I was teaching a comb back rocking chair class. My friend Bill Anderson was in it – it was the first time we’d built chairs together since we co-taught at the John C. Campbell Folk School ten or 15 years ago. I built one rocker in the class and started another – they are unpainted so you get to choose. $2500 (usually $2800) BOTH SOLD
This birdcage is the oldest chair I have for sale – I made it in 2013 with a student. The back is a little more upright than most of my chairs, but I really like it. $2300 (usually $2600) SOLD
This was another mistake – far the worst mistake with an order I’ve made in 20 years of chairmaking. The fellow wanted a rocker and this is what I made him. Luckily I happened to send him a photo of it before it went in the crate – he was very gracious and I’ve had it at our table for the last year. I now send a photo before every chair I ship. I rather like this chair, which is saying a lot since I tend towards the traditional. $2000 (usually $2200)
Reproduction of an early 19th Century writing arm chair in the Dewitt Wallace Museum at Colonial Williamsburg.
I’ve saved the best for last. This is a copy of a chair in the Colonial Williamsburg collection, attributed to William Challen of Lexington, KY (he was in NY before that, where he has the first known ad for a fancy chair, a style of early 19th. chairs that became intensely popular). Seth and I spent two days measuring the chair, we came home and spent a couple months learning how to build it, then we did a presentation on it at the Working Wood symposium in January 2020. I turned everything on a pole lathe, bored all the holes with spoon bits, then Williamsburg’s conservator Chris Swan spent a couple weeks finishing it with period paints. The black marks are called smoke graining – you hold the chair, painted in half-wet paint, up to a candle and the soot adheres to the paint in swirling clouds. I signed a contract that I would not make any more of these, so this chair is truly unique and will remain so. $6500
