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Thursday, August 23, 2012

Danish Box Weave Folding Chair



This low folding chair is woven with a 'Danish Box Weave' pattern.  Clearly it had suffered some significant damage to the seat.  Maybe someone tried to use it as a stepping stool?  Just for future reference, woven furniture should never be used under foot!  It is sturdy enough to sit on, but when you have your entire weight on one small (foot sized) area of the weaving,  especially if the fibers are old and brittle, then those fibers can break.  Once one strand breaks,  the surrounding area becomes weaker and other strands nearby tend to start breaking.  Then you have a problem!  And then you need to do what this client did and bring that chair in to us.

We re-wove the seat of this chair using traditional danish weave materials.  This material is called 'danish cord' and is actually made out of paper!  The cord is waxed so it has something of a protective coating, but if it is really soaked then those fibers become weak, just like regular paper.  As long as you keep furniture woven with danish cord inside, then it should last you for years and years to come.  If you look closely at the 'finished' side of the top picture you can see that the back of the chair is darker then the seat.  This is because, like all weaving materials, it darkens over time.  Eventually you will not notice that the seat and back are different shades. 
 Hopefully at that point no one breaks the weaving in the back, because then we would have to start all over!

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