A Brief History About the Divergent Members of the Chair Family

We live in this world where everybody belongs to a family. We, as humans, only tend to think about our family and our people, whereas, if we take a look at nature, every species existing in this world belongs to a larger family. Similarly, the chairs that we use in everyday life are not just a furniture item that promises to serve you with the utmost comfort, but it is also a name of the broad range of differently styled, four-legged furniture products, that serve the same purpose.

If we can recall about how many types of chairs have we used in our life at our home, schools or anywhere else, we can barely name more than two of them. But, the family includes very rarely known members also, in fact, there are numerous more designs whose names are hardly even heard of. So read the following to get introduced to a few of them:

Fauteuil Chair: Pronounced as ‘Foe-toy’, This chair has a literal meaning as an armchair. This uniquely designed upholstered armchair was born in the late 1600 BC and got to taste the fame in the early 18th Century. With its use by the esteemed Emperor Louis XIV, this chair got more modified with the passage of time. This ornate design was supposedly used by mostly the men in the society. Therefore, another version of this prestigious chair, named Fauteuil à la Reine, was invented only for the use of Queen.

Historic Corner Chair: These are the most precisely designed corner chairs that can be an absolute space saver if you nestle it towards any corner of your house. The armchair has diagonally attached, square seats that have leg supporting the seat at all the four corners. The special feature about this is that the backrest is at a right angle, and its legs can be straight or cabriole.

Gondola Chair: Similar to the prow of the gondola Boat, this chair has sloppy armrests. There is, in addition to its beauty, a C-shaped back continuing towards the end of the seat. Initially, this term was used to name the side chairs with open backs, but now any seat that is dramatically curved at its back is called to be a gondola chair. This chair was first invented in the mid 17th Century in France and got very prominent till the end of that century. The varied versions of this is called as barrel or tub, but they are not as heavily designed as the original gondola chair.

Curule: This antique chair has cross legs, in such a way that it looks like an interlocked U-shaped structure or, to many, it can be like a curved X-like structure. This light weight, thus portable, furniture product has a low back and is an attractive representative of the bygone emperors’ period. With the passage of time, these chairs started to be recognized as the scissor chairs and eventually lost their use with the passage of time.

Rococo: The most decorated type of historical chair is a Rococo chair, which has two C-shaped knots, appearing interlaced just like a ribbon or a bow. This came into existence with the beginning of the 18th Century. One modification of this chair is a ladder-back chair which is prominently used today.