A blue occasional chair » Search by style and size

What is the best way to measure the space to fit an occasional chair in?

Furniture Ferret: Measure both the width and the depth of the floor area where you'd like to place an occasional chair. The most accurate way is to use a measuring tape. Hold the beginning down at the edge of the area, and let it run to the other edge. Make sure the tape is not diagonal, or else you would overestimate the available space. If the distance is larger than what you can stretch to, ask someone else for help, or divide what you need to measure into multiple parts. This can be done by either holding the tape down halfway and continuing running it while letting the first end go, or by marking how far you have measured on the floor or wall, and start a new measurement. If you want to avoid drawing on the floor, you can position a pointy object like a pen there instead. Don't forget to avoid dead places where the piece of furniture won't be able to go like decorative strips. Also it may be necessary to take the height of the space and the item into account wherever the ceiling is uneven like in loft rooms.

Questions and answers

How do I spot a bargain when buying an occasional chair?

You can check whether an item you like is overpriced or underpriced by comparing it to the median price. The median price is £179.99 which means that exactly half of the occasional chairs costs more and half costs less. Most of the occasional chairs in this section cost between 110 British pounds and 749 British pounds. This means that 90% of the products are between the two figures. £263.50 is the average price of occasional chairs in this category.

How to use colour theory when choosing an occasional chair?

The colour scheme in your space can be a result of necessity, but it has considerable effect on how you feel in your space. The two things to consider for everything colour is balance and associations. Balance means that the colours should be coordinated in some way, so that the space looks like a unit instead of a random collection of elements. Usual techniques to achieve this are considering a colour wheel, and going for colours that are either quite close to each other (as colours that are only different in lightness or intensity do go together, but slight variations in tone or hue can also work), or quite far, for example on different halves of the wheel (complementary colours like red and green) or on different thirds (for example, cyan-orange-purple). Other colour combinations are likely be somewhat jarring because of how our eyes and brains understand colour. Associations with and emotions connected to colours are equally important to keep in mind. It is quite probable that these emotions are cultural and learnt, which means that they can be quite different for different individuals. Blue is often associated with productivity, but also calmness, stability and even sadness. Green is undoubtedly the colour of nature, and is considered to be connected to safety, luck and envy (though in other cultures this latter is yellow instead). White can be connected to peacefulness, innocence, cleanliness and emptiness, and, for example, mourning in India. Red is regarded as the colour of friendship, energy, leadership, desire and revenge, which is a very wide range of emotions. But it is clear that in nature, it signals danger or importance, so it should be put next to a neutral colour to allow the brain to rest. These emotions point in so many different directions that these guidelines seem to boil down to just this: pause and see what the colour means for you.

From the history of furniture: Chairs and sofas Part 1

The oldest piece of cabinet-maker's work known is Queen Hatasu's chair, of the eighteenth Egyptian Dynasty, sixteen hundred years before the Christian Era. It is made of ivory, ebony, and various metals, and is in the British Museum, London. There is another old chair in which one may take a more per sonal interest, and whose early history is so enveloped in legend and myth that it is impossible to tell where tradition ends and truth begins. This is the Coronation Chair of England, in which all English sovereigns since 1273 have been crowned. The wood has become very solid and hard, but still shows in various places the traces of paint. In 1298 Edward I brought from Scotland the stone upon which all the Scottish kings had been crowned for centuries, and this was inserted in the seat of the English chair. It is a piece of coarse sandstone, twentj'-six inches long, seventeen broad, and ten and one-half inches thick. It shows very plainly in the photograph, which also displays to advantage the mm Gothic character of the chair (Figure 63).

Sir James Ware, who lived from 1594 to 1666, writing about this same stone which is set in the Coronation Chair, says:

"Nor ought we to pass by unmentioned that fatal stone, antiently called liafail, brought into Ireland by the Tuath-de-Danans, and from thence in the reign of Moriertach Mac Ere sent into Argile to his brother Fergus, but which was afterwards inclosed in a wooden chair by King Keneth to serve in the coronation solemnities of the King of Scotland, and deposited in the Monastery of Scone, from whence it was at length removed to Westminster by Edward I. Wonderful things are reported of this stone, but what credibility they deserve I leave to the judgement of others. In particular fame reports, that in times of heathenism before the birth of Christ, he only was confirmed Monarch of Ireland, under whom, being placed upon it, this stone groaned or spoke, according to the Book of Hoath."

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We strive to allow everyone to live comfortably even if they only own a small space they call home. We scan multiple webshops for thousands of desks, cabinets, bookcases, shoe cabinets, beds, sofabeds and so on by size, to find just the right one for you to go in that unused corner and turn it into a dressing corner, or to find that extra long sofa that is still narrow enough to squeeze through the bedroom door. From the kitchen to the bedroom, don't live around furniture - buy furniture that lives with you.