A while back I restored a vintage Kai Kristiansen model 42 Z Chair. Simultaneously I was building my first bike frame, and I started to see bicycle geometry in the chair’s angles. Using a few old frames from a scrap pile, I started experimenting with ways to cut them up and make a chair with the same basic angles and dimensions.
The original model 42 chair was made with bent plywood under the upholstered seat and back. I experimented with laminating several layers of thin plywood over a form, and achieved the same comfortable shape as the original chair. While the upholstered seat and back go perfectly with the warm woodwork of the original, in my version it felt right to have bare wood accompany the raw metal.
The swiveling backrest, a feature of the vintage chair that I wanted to replicate, required fabricating custom mounting parts.
- Recycled bicycle frames, cherry plywood
- 21″ wide x 23″ deep x 31″ tall