Ash amd Walnut Three Leg Chair

This is the third version of my three leg chair. I posted my Modigliani version earlier.

Most of my chair projects have curved soft edges and are finished in a dark colour. The light colour, angular shapes and hard lines are a bit of a departure for me.

The chair is made from Ash with a Walnut stretcher and accents.

The seat is carved from a 2 inch thick glued up Ash blank. It is attached to the diagonal back legs with a Maloof style joint.

The back is a tapered bent lamination. It is made up of two book matched pieces each constructed from eight laminations. The laminations taper from about 1/8 inch thick at the top to ¼ inch at the bottom. I made a taper sled to run each lamination through the thickness planer, but had quite a difficult time making these tapered laminations. I spite of installing newly sharpened knives and adjusting the planer as best I could for each good one I made there was one wasted lamination.

Each lamination was attached to the sled with double faced tape. If the bond between the lamination and the sled was not absolutely secure, combined with the difficult grain of the ash, the planer would tear the thin end of the lamination to pieces. As a result a number of my choice book matched laminations, which I had planned to use for the front and back faces, were destroyed.

The back supports are also tapered bent laminations capped front and back with a walnut lamination.

When I was cutting the Walnut spindles for my Maloof style rocker to their final width I ended up with a number of thin strips. I just couldn’t throw them out because ” someday I would find a use for them”. I glued them together and used them for the stretcher that runs between the front rail and the diagonal leg.

With the exception of two screws the chair is pinned together with walnut dowels and glue.

In spite of how it might look the chair is rock solid to sit on and with the sculpted seat and sloped curved back it is actually quite comfortable.

I resisted the temptation to get out the my “go-to” stain, Minwax English Chestnut, and left the ash its natural colour. It is finished with a number of coats of tung oil.