This is a rocking chair I designed and constructed for my mums 65th birthday. Curved Lamination was relatively new to me. I have always been a firm believer in heavy strong and durable pieces of furniture promoting longevity. With this piece I wanted to take a different approach, simplicity and elegance. I wanted it to be as structurally sound a s possible but using the least amount of material possible.

After some research, Maple, Ash & Cherry were good choices for bending. So I initially drew up the design in sketchup, then more accurate measurements in Cad which I printed out on a 1:1 scale and used them templates for my formers. Once set the smaller Dewalt thicknesser was beautiful to pass the curved frame pieces through as the machine was so shallow.

The joinery I used was slip tenons in mahongany, glued and screwed with Ebony plugs.

The seat was actually a slab of Irish Elm that was thrown in the workshop corner for so long. It came up nice I think and shaped well too.

I finished in Shellac, Osmo Oil and Pate Wax.

Thanks for reading and any comments are appreciated.

BTW, Sam Maloof gave me some inspiration too in his outstanding chair making!

Launch Gallery