Designing a chair is an intense mash-up of engineering, function, style, and sculpture. Chairs are a free standing, three-dimensional piece of furniture and the average person can exert up to 500lbs of force when sitting. There are so many considerations to designing a functional and aesthetically pleasing chair. In this class we take a deep dive into designing and modeling a chair. We will first look at chairs and talk about design considerations: what is the seat height? How much weight to support? What is the purpose of the chair? We’ll start with sketching and then go into loose scale modeling. Once we close in on a design, we will do a full scale mock-up out of cardboard and other materials to make sure we have good proportion in three dimensions. When we have a full scale model we’ll make a solid component chair—that you can sit in, and make other necessary design changes so you have the aesthetics and comfort needed. You will go home with this prototype which will be your road map to making your chair at home. The advantage of working in this way is that you have worked through all your design issues and fixed all the flaws, and now you’re ready to build the chair you’ve always wanted. The design portion of this class will be at North House, and when we move into full scale modeling we will be working out of the instructor’s studio in Grand Marais.

You will need the following tools for this class:

All required tools/materials are provided by your instructor and North House and will be available once the course begins.

Feel free to bring your favorite tools and whatever materials you might feel appropriate for this course.