What Is In A Name?

Tags

Caning, Danish Cord, Fiber Rush, Genuine Rush, Hand Caning, Names, seat weaving, Splint

What is in a name you ask?

It has amazed me over the years that I have been a “Seat Weaver” how all the various forms of seat weaving has been lumped into one category called “Caning”.

I have tried over the years to educate customers when they come to me and say I have a set of chairs to be caned, knowing that in most cases it is NOT a caned chair; but a Splint Bottom, Rush Bottom, Danish Cord, Sea-grass, or one of many forms of  seat weaving, sometimes I have gotten wicker, and it was referred to as caning.

Usually the customer will tell me it is a hand caned chair, then look at a hand caned chair and say NO, it looks nothing like that, and it turns out to be a rush chair.

It kinds of make one wonder where down the road ages past that all forms of seat weaving became Caning? I wish that I had the answer to share with all of you, however I do not.

Hand Caning- entirely woven by hand, to form the little octagonal hole pattern that becomes the seat, also known as the 7 step pattern

Pressed or Sheet Caning- Comes in a sheet form, is soaked and cut to size, then placed over top of a groove or channel cut into the chair seat, which is held in place by a reed spline. This process is much like replacing a window screen.

Genuine Rush or Fiber Rush- commonly described as being woven of a rope like material, which forms what looks like four envelope flaps with points meeting in the center.

Fiber Rush is a tightly twisted and in most cases a brown heavy kraft brown paper.

Genuine Rush- Is made from bulrushes or cattail leaves, the leaves are gathered and the rope is made entirely by hand as you weave the seat, this form of rush is very labor intensive and usually reserved for museum quality chairs.

Splint- Usually woven in a 3/3 herringbone twill pattern, sometimes 2/2 twill herringbone twill pattern, or a basket weave pattern, the latter two are more time consuming as the weave is much tighter and takes longer to pack the rows together.Splint can come in many forms, the most common today is reed splint, Oak and Hickory, here the latter two in some cases is cost prohibitive to customers as the cost is higher due to the splints being made from the tree, with a draw knife and leather chaps to split out the splints to ready for weaving.

Danish Cord- This is common in Danish Modern Furniture, again like Fiber Rush, it is a twisted paper only  made in Denmark, unlike fiber rush, it is usually finer and much harder in texture, also it is white or off white in color.

The world of “Seat Weaving” is much more complex than just caning,  there are many different style of seat weaving and all have individual names, and very different weaving styles.

I will note here that most customers look and say I never knew, so here I have tried to explain the various forms in hopes you will look at your chairs in a whole new light.

It is my aim soon to post an article with pictures of all the various forms of “Seat Weaving ” to give you a better idea of what all of this is about.

Pressed Cane and Rush Seats this Week

Tags

Austrailia, Cane, Chairs, Eucalyptus, Eucalyptus Chairs, Eucalyptus Furniture, Fiber Rush, Furniture, Genuine Rush, Hand Crafted, Oak, Pressed Cane, Rush, Word Press Problems

Eucalyptus Chair-Australia

Well the week ahead looks like we will be honing our skills on pressed cane and rush seats. In the studio we now have several oak chairs with pressed cane seats, in addition is several nice chairs from a customer in Northern Virinia, that were aquired while they were living in Singapore. These chairs were hand made in Australia and are of Eucalyptus Wood, they are finely detailed with Queen Anne Legs. These chairs are very elegant and have pressed cane seats, as well as backs, however just the seats need replacing.

There are also a pair of Oak dinning room chairs with small pressed cane seats, typical of this style of chair, as compared to the Eucalyptus chairs above, which have the entire sitting area of the chair in pressed/sheet cane.

The final chair in the studio in pressed cane is a black dinning chair, which need gluing and clamping in several places before the seat is replaced.

The Rush chair on hand to do at this time are Hitchcock in design, one having the drop in seat, meaning tht the framework that the rush is done on pops out of the chair, it is re-rushed and put back and held in place with screws. The second originally done in genuine rush (you twist the rope itself by hand) from cattail leaves into a hand twited rope and rush the chair from start to finish. This art while done years ago, has been widely replaced by the use of Fiber Rush (a tightly twisted brown kraft paper) that forms a rope, from that it is woven onto the seat or drop-frame. Asa “Genuine Rush is costly and time consuming and is usually reserved for heirlooms and museum quality work in today’s world.”

Oak Pressed Cane Chair

Seat Detail

The second picture shows a broken side piece that needs to be glued, and clamped and screwed back into place before the cane can be installed.

The two pictures on the left show an Oak Chair, which the pressed cane has totally worn out.

When the new cane has been installed, the cane will be stained to give it an aged appearance.

Rush Seats

Next on the list for this week is the replacement of two rush seats. One having a genuine rush seat that has deteriorated and will be replaced with Fiber Rush. Hitchcock style chairs usually incur a dis-assembly/re-assembly charge, as you have to remove button covers in the rear of the chair, also prying out wood strips from around the chair and removing a front decorative piece that is screwed into place, this forms a decorative as well as protective frame work around the rushed interior of the seat.  All of this takes time to do just to get to the seat itself before rushing can take place.

The second chair has what is known as a drop in seat, it has been rushed with fiber rush that has worn and broken on the front rail, this is the common place for most rush to weaken and brake, as it gets all the weight and pressure from the thighs rubbing along the front edge of the seat. The interior of this seat is removable, however in some ways it it makes it more difficult over the rushing taking place directly on the chair rails itself.

Hitchcock Style Genuine Rush Chair

Hitchcock Style Genuine Rush Close Up

Note the back, side and front wood trim that needs to be removed and replaced in order to get to the seat to be woven.

In some cases there are wooden dowels or buttons in the rear behind the seat that need to be removed, that cover screws to release the wood frame on this type of chair.

This seat is not that way, most of those have heavier wide trim going around the seat.

Underside of Genuine Rush Seat

The next chair is the Hitchcock style with the removable drop in seat, where the inner frame must be removed in order that the rushing can take place, while this seems to be a simple task, it is much easier to re-rush in the chair frame. Nails or small strips or blocks of wood need to be tacked into place where the top of the leg posts would be normally, this is to hold the new rush in place until the finished seat can be replaced into the chair.

Drop In Rush Close Up

Modern day manufacturer’s of Rush Style Chairs, that specialize in mass production often resort to the drop in seat, as the chair can be manufactured in one country, and the seat in another or in another totally separate area of the factory, the assembled in another.

Premium furniture manufacturer’s such as Suter’s Hadcrafted Furniture- Harrisonburg, Virginia and Chlore”s of Madison, Virginia still rush the chairs they make right in the chair and do not use drop in frames. I am sure there are many others, however this is still done mainly by manufacturer’s of Hand Crafted Furniture, not neccessarily mass produced.

Pictures of the finished chairs will be posted in a separate post, later this week.

Please Note: The layout of this article is not the way it is supposed to be. I have found that Word Press has a mind of its own. It shows you what you think you will get, publishes something entirely differnt. Please be patient until I can find out how to correct this.

A Mixed Day of Seat Weaving

Tags

antique, Bottoms, Caning, Chair, child's rocker, drop-in seats, Fiber, Fiber Rush, Hand Caning, Herringbone Twill, hickory, Hitchcock Chair, Oak, photo's, Reed, rocker, Rush, Splint, studio

Child's Oak Rocker

This week is starting off with a mixed day of different seat weaving styles here. While most people unknowingly lump all seat weaving styles into the one catagory of “Caning” or “Hand Caning” each actually has different names.

Today I will be working on the 3 major styles. These Styles are Hand Caning, Splint Bottoms, and Rush. In the studio now is a hand caned side chair, an old childs antiques rocking chair, which has a splint bottom seat, and two Hitchcock style side chairs. One needs the original “Genuine Rush Seat” replaced with Fiber Rush, a tightly twisted brown kraft type paper in a rope like form. The second Hitchcock style chair is a newer version, which has what is known a s a Drop-In seat, meaning that the Rushing is done on a wooden frame separately from the chair, then when done the seat is placed back into the chair.

Child’s Oak Splint Bottom Rocker

The following photo’s show the rocker the way it came to the studio, the seat appeared to be Hickory, though worn and deteriorating. This set of photo’s will show “Before, During and After” replacing the old bottom with the new reed splint bottom, in the 3/3 Herringbone Twill pattern. More pictures will be added to this post, as they become available.

After

Before

During

Danish Cord Chairs

Tags

3 ply, Chairs, Cord, Danish, Danish Chairs, Danish Cord, Danish L Nails, Fiber Rush, rope, Seats, twisted paper

This week I finished a set of Danish Cord Chairs made by the Moller Company in Denmark. These were beautiful Cherry Chairs made in the 1960′s. The Danish Cord on the old seats had all been destroyed by cats clawing on them, what you are looking at here are the beautiful new woven seats.

Danish Cord is a very strong 3 ply twisted paper rope, even though Fiber Rush is used on many chairs, and is strong in its own right, Danish Cord, has a beauty and strength all it own. Plus the techniques used to weave the seats are entirely different from one another.

Danish Cord wraps around a series of “Danish L Nails” which are on the under side of the chair frame usually some where around 72-80 nails, on which the cording is wrapped around.

You will be able to tell I am new to blogging with this post, there are several close ups that I wanted to post, but have no idea how to rotate the pictures, so that you don’t have to lay on your sides to see them correctly.so for now, this is the only picture, there will be more to come though.