Emeco Navy Chair

[summilux]

On a recent road trip I listed to a podcast about the Emeco Navy Chair. I’m not much interested in modernist furniture so I’d never heard of one before. Emeco got its start building indestructible and fireproof chairs for US Navy submarines in 1944. They built hundreds of thousands of these aluminum chairs but by the late 20th century Emeco was going bankrupt. The company was saved when the owner overheard a heated conversation between the office manager and some guy named Georgio Armani. Emeco then decided to sell their chairs to upscale architectural firms and designers instead of to the government. Their current chairs are all aluminum, still made in the original PA factory and sell for $700 USD or so. The legend is that you can toss one out an eight story window and it won’t break. You can also get one in fire red.

The podcast link is below and also to a video of Emeco manufacturing. When I saw the chair-making video, I was reminded of videos from the old US Cannondale plant. Pretty cool.



77 Steps - 99% Invisible

[72gmc]

I was pacing around some airport somewhere when I listened to that 99PI podcast. As with other 99PI podcasts, it's well done and caused me to go down a research rabbit hole. Pretty sure I spotted a fake Emeco while hearing about them.

[deano]

I was pacing around some airport somewhere when I listened to that 99PI podcast. As with other 99PI podcasts, it's well done and caused me to go down a research rabbit hole. Pretty sure I spotted a fake Emeco while hearing about them.

Don't ask me how, but we have four of these at our kitchen table. They are every bit as good as their reputation. Ours have unfortunately been refinished a handful of times and have a cushion attached, but nothing that can't be brought back to original. Hmm. Maybe if we do the retro kitchen remodel we've been considering, some fire engine red powdercoat on these bad boys would be just the ticket.

2018-09-06_02-08-05 by z937, on Flickr

[deano]

I am grading papers in one of these chairs now and realized I missed a golden opportunity in my first post: laterally stiff and vertically compliant.

[dgaddis]

They make a bunch of chairs, and some are pretty dang cool. I like the "cheap" ones, made of recycled aluminum cans.

111 NAVY(R) CHAIR

[donk]

We have six of the emeco 111 for our dining room table in various colours.

They are made of 111 2 litre plastic pop bottles, qualify for LEED points in a building and are really comfortable to sit on.

If I had the money, we'd have 6 of the originals.

[dgaddis]

Totally missed that the 111's are plastic, not aluminum. Reading is hard!

[Peter Polack]

Until they come in titanium or carbon fiber, I ain't buyin...

[dgaddis]

Has anyone else noticed the chairs recently with raw fillet brazes? I first saw them at a place in Augusta, and have seen them a time or two since then. Brazing work obviously isn't vSalon quality, but it's still pretty cool IMO.

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