Bursting Balls!

You’re shopping for a chair online and you want something different.  Something cool, like you’ve seen on design blogs and in trade show reviews.  Something innovative, comfortable and good for your posture.

It looms…

Then you run across a product called the Ball Chair.  Its various permutations are similar, but the one question running through your mind as you look at the attractive folks perched perfectly on their chairs is,

“Is this thing going to explode when I sit on it?”

That’s the first thing I thought, at least.  But never fear!  The Evolution chair is made with high quality anti-burst material, and direct from Evolution’s site:

Our anti-burst balance ball is eco-friendly and latex-free. It is also 6P-free, meaning it does not contain the 6 most harmful phthalates contained in some other balance balls or plastic products.

Good for the environment, good for the back.  What’s not to love?  Two of my co-workers sit on them, and we all occasionally do a little quick yoga in the office.  Only when the bosses are not here, catch my drift?

Making Flippy-Floppy

Hey, remember these guys?

Fashion and brilliance, what’s not to love?

The Talking Heads are one of the seminal bands of the 70s/80s, and David Byrne  was the mastermind behind their groundbreaking music.

Did you know he’s also designed chairs?

The Mohawk Chair

 

When asked simply, “Why chairs?”, this is what Mr. Byrne had to say:

Well, they have arms and legs and vaguely human scale — and shape. They’re people — they hold you, support you, elevate you or humble you. They’re funny or elegant, funky or gorgeous, social or aloof. They’re characters with lives and histories…aren’t they?

Pretty much every architect or artist working in a sculptural medium is confronted with the chair design question at some point in their lives.  It’s nice to see that Mr. Big Suit can join the party!

Stackability

Dornob‘s done it again, this time with a unique take on economic, stackable chairs.

Design? Meet function!

The Triplette Chair by French designer Paul Menand is a sight for sore eyes for yours truly.  I used to work in a liquor store with a tasting room, and for every event we had to set up tables and chairs for our customers.

Cue entry into the cobwebbed storeroom, filled with stacks of bent old nested chairs.  They were a nightmare to separate and even worse to stack again.  Even though they were upholstered, they weren’t very comfortable, and at 5’4″ I can tell you that lifting one of the metal monsters above your head to try and stack it so that it won’t fall on you while you’re negotiating the stack back into the closet isn’t fun.

Menand solved my problem and thousands others like it, not to mention the woes of entertaining in small loft spaces, with his Triplette.  Who doesn’t want three chairs in one?  The best part of this design is that the “storage container” can be used as a single chair when you’re not in need of extra seating.

More for your money

Eurotech’s New Model

The folks over at Eurotech know their chairs.  The Ergohuman alone is our most popular model, coming in around several thousand sales per year.  Their new model introduces two wonderful features that promote simplicity and elegance of design.

Ergo-chic

Say goodbye to tons of buttons and levers - for 2012, Eurotech’s upped the ante in ergonomic seating with a brand new single lever mechanism that controls your seat height, seat slide position and back angle.

Do your elbows slide off your armrests?  Eurotech’s come up with a solution. You can now adjust your armrest position and angle as well as the height.

Total adjustment equals total comfort

Eurotech’s taken a clean, beautiful design and made it even more accomodating to their customer base.  And, at half the price of a Herman Miller, Eurotech’s providing their consumers with exceptional value.  Contact us to order yours today!

I’m going to have to put you on the grid, Kevin.

The folks over at Dornob never disappoint.  This time it’s with armchairs inspired by TRON: Legacy, designed by Dror Benshetrit.

I fight for the users!

Made from recyclable material, these chairs are certainly eye-catching, if not totally comfortable.  Each piece is designed with colors, angles and materials that call to mind the decades-old question: Are you a program, or are you a user?

Ergoweekend!

Columbus Day Weekend is almost upon us, and I think we’re all looking forward to the 3-day holiday.  Just in time, there’s a new post up at our sister blog, Sit Correct, on the application of ergonomics in the workplace.  Slouchers beware!

Enjoy the last of the sunny weather for the fall!

This one is for the fidgeters.

Varier’s come out with a press release on a recent study done using their Move Stool for ADD/ADHD children in which they found that providing an outlet for fidgeting  increases aptitude and learning.

I remember being a kid and having trouble sitting still, be it at home or at school.  Even now it’s hard to sit at my desk and work uninterrupted.  As a writer with more than my fair share of imagination, I process ideas the best when I’m in motion, be it pacing or gesticulating while talking to myself.  As a new teacher I need to come up with all sorts of learning strategies to engage my kids, and the more freedom I give them to move, the more ownership they have over their learning and their work in the classroom.

Humans are active.  We sprawl, lean, tap, drum and generally wiggle our way through the day. It’s unnatural to sit still for hours, and a static body promotes a static mind.  By allowing kids the freedom to move while they read and interact in a classroom, we encourage the development of their kinetic intelligence and actually, believe it or not, promote healthier brain function.

The same goes for adults in the workplace, and companies like Varier focus on ergonomic options for the active adult as well as their smaller Move Stool for kids.  The Move Stool and their line of kneeling chairs give us the freedom to fidget in the office while providing great ergonomic support for our bodies.  What’s not to love?

Slouch-asaurus Rex

Our friends at Varier recently posted about the importance of posture – only this time, they’re not talking about in the office.

So, you have an ergonomic chair in the office.  You sit in it 8 hours a day.  You make sure to adjust your position periodically to support your spine.  You’re more alert throughout your day and by the time you leave, that early morning stiffness you came in with is gone.  What’s the first thing you do when you go home?

If you’re me, you throw something on the grill, flip on the TV and instantly slouch back onto your sofa.  This negates your daily efforts toward perfect posture, and it promotes long-term spinal damage:

 If your home seating fails to maintain the natural curve of your low back, indeed encourages you to sit in a sustained slouch, then the ligaments in your back are going to be stretched, just as they are if you sit badly in the office. As a result the small stretch receptors in the ligaments and deep muscles of your back will tire of their protective role and switch off, and you lose the reflex that automatically protects your spine. Your spinal stability is gone and your spine is now very vulnerable to injury. And all the time you are sitting slouched, fluid is emerging from the muscles, ligaments, discs and joints, irritating the spinal structures, and creating inflammation.

Put simply, habitual slouching = inflammation = injury.  Sitting well in the office does not cancel out the damage you do to your back at home.

We don’t usually think about ergonomic seating in the home.  It’s long been an important issue where we work, but at home our personal rule is the softer, the better. Varier doesn’t agree, and neither do we.  We’ve blogged about the Gravity Chair before, but now is the perfect time to reconsider your home seating arrangements.

You don’t have to sacrifice style with the Gravity Chair and, most importantly, your money goes to support the continued flexibility and health of your back.  At 25 and as a habitual sloucher, I’m already experiencing early-morning soreness and a loss of flexibility that has me worried.  The earlier you become aware of your posture and take steps to correct it, the healthier and easier your mobility will become as you get older.

Varier’s committed to bringing beautiful, healthy seating to you no matter where you are.  We at Seating Zone are proud to offer their phenomenal products in the US.

And just think – a kneeling chair at work and a Gravity Chair at home?  I’m all about matching, and this sounds like a dream come true.

Frameless, fabulous?

Core77′s design awards showcase a unique line of products designed with function and comfort in mind.  One of the big beauties this time around is the Herman Miller SAYL chair.  Its laid-back design delivers total support for the active office worker without sacrificing style. The SAYL offers injection-molded mesh that conforms to your body without bulky lumbar pillows.

But best of all, it’s unpretentious.  It’s aesthetically pleasing without too many frills and is one of the best examples of functional design I’ve seen in awhile.

From the onset, we understood that designing a chair (and no less fro Herman Miller) was an amazing design challenge. There is no place to hide in a chair; every part serves a structural or tactile purpose, while providing comfort, ergonomic support and beauty. We approved this challenge with the overall goal of attainability.

It’s also designed to be affordable for a wide market, which is a huge plus.  This isn’t your grandfather’s executive chair!

Excuse me, sir, but is that a bomb you’re sitting on?

The folks over at Dornob.com came up with a gem today:  Blast Stools!

No, really.  Blast Stools.  The stool starts as a metal cylinder or box carefully shaped and welded together by Guy Mishaly and his cohorts.  They place charges at strategic points around the cylinder and literally BLOW IT UP, causing the leg sections to curl in.  Then they polish, grind and voila!  Your very own blow’d up chair.

Check out the link, because they’ve thoughtfully provided a video of one of these babies from inception to explosion.

I want one.  Heck, I want to make one!