This chair is one of the most famous chairs within the café furniture industry. Manufactured originally by Thonet, it has also been named the bistro chair, which in the café furniture industry is quite a coveted title. Designed by Michael Thonet in the 19^th century using a unique steam-bending technology, also known as bentwood that during that time required years to perfect and master. It has a simple design and affordability it has been one of the bestselling chairs on the market, with a total of 50 million sold between 1860 and 1930 and since then the sales have kept on coming.

The chair has been made from six pieces of wood with a total of 10 screws to hold the cafe chair together with only 2 nuts. The wood is made from beech wood, that are heated to 100 degrees Celsius and pressed into cast-iron moulds. They are then dried at 70 degrees for just under a day to make sure that they are strong and robust. The reason that these bistro chairs were sold at an affordable price was because the materials used are cheap and the labour used are mainly unskilled.

This chair has been widely renowned as a design classic. When it was first produced it earned a gold medal in the 1867 World Exposition in Paris and has been praised by some of the worlds best and creative designers. For example Le Corbusier has been recorded in saying “Never was a better and more elegant design and a more precisely crafted and practical item created.”

In recent years, 2009 to be precise the chair was redesigned and remanufactured by the English designer James Irvine and retailed from Muji, a Japanese company. Roland Ohnacker, the managing director of Thonet stated that the aim of this was to “help 18 to 35 year olds enter the world of Thornet”

In today’s cafés and restaurants, we tend to see furniture that has been mass produced and often feature similar styles. For instance we see a lot of chairs made in the 50s and 60s that are iconic however we don’t see that many made recently that stand the test of time. There are still designers out there bringing café furniture design back into fashion and below are a couple that have been nominated for the student category at The Edge 2012 in Sydney next month.

A cafe chair made out of belts and a cafe barstool which can have any pattern cut into it are the two ideas in question. Alex Lee, the creator of the belt chair seems to believe that his café chair made from belts was nominated for its originality.

‘‘As students we can afford to be creative and push the boundaries like I have with this design,’’ the 30 year old designer said. ‘‘But once we’re working in the industry we’ll be more limited by commercial constraints. So this is a great opportunity to show my design aesthetic off to potential contacts such as interior designers and decorators.’’

He claimed that when he was younger his brother and he used to play around modifying old furniture. This could have been office furniture, café furniture or domestic furniture, he claims that he was attracted to taking things apart and being able to create new pieces.

The other piece of café furniture that has been nominated is a barstool that can have bespoke designs added by cutting at the sides. The Bent stool is made from 4 equilateral triangles that have been riveted together.

The young 22 year old designer claims that he got inspiration for the design from the demand of café and restaurant owners looking for different and fashionable designs. As it stands he has managed to find a manufacturer for the furniture in Hong Kong however he plans to change the material used to Aluminium to make the chair lighter and ready for commercial production.

It is quite common to have a certain amount of hand luggage when entering a café. It comes as no surprise then that designer Kaman Tung has designed café furniture that actually holds luggage within the chair to avoid it becoming lost. This collection includes 3 café chairs and a café table that have a timber frame and finished in white plastic. These chairs have been specifically designed for outdoor public spaces, restaurant areas and cafes.

The idea for these café chairs and table came from the notion that people have the need to place their coats or luggage on the back of the chairs or on the floor. The idea is that with these chairs, it reduces the worry that items might be stolen and articles don’t have to be placed on a really dirty floor. For example, in bars and restaurants, it seems that we always put our coats on the back of our chairs. With this in mind, The Hanger Chair is one solution. The chair looks like a normal outdoor chair, however has a branch like feature that extends out over the back of the chair and provides a hanger for long coats and jackets. The reason for this is that many coats tend to be too long for the chairs back to hang on and can touch the dirty floor from time to time.

The Case Chair is for people who carry suitcases or laptops with them. There is a side compartment with this chair that can house a these precious items eliminating the worry that these could be stolen. Also with these items placed at the side of the person, it reduces the risk of the user forgetting them before they leave.

The table is a glass table that has a recessed area underneath the top that has been designed to house wallets and personal items that are designed to increase comfort when sitting down.

As outlined in previous articles, furniture whether it is café furniture, restaurant furniture, bistro furniture etc… is probably the biggest investment you are likely to make (apart from the premises) when opening up your business. It is important not only to ensure that the furniture matches your establishment’s décor but also is of high grade and is suitable for commercial use.

It tends to be that retail café furniture or restaurant furniture is cheaper than commercial furniture for a number of reasons, so you can see why a lot of companies, particularly during today’s climate, choose the cheaper option. If you do require furniture for commercial use then buying the right grade furniture is a must for a couple of reasons.

The first is that retail furniture tends to be for residential use. What I mean by this is that it doesn’t tend to be used for long periods of time. Commercial grade café furniture or restaurant furniture is used more frequently and gets more use as there tends to be a high turnover of people. Not only this, but the size and weight of people vary so it puts more stress on the café chairs or restaurant chairs. If you buy domestic furniture then these will tend not to last that long and you will probably find that you will be changing your restaurant furniture and outdoor furniture within a year, in particular the restaurant chairs.

The second reason for buying commercial furniture rather than retail is liability. Most furniture that has been built for commercial use comes with a liability warranty if someone has an accident due to the furniture breaking. Retail furniture does not have this with regards to commercial use and if you use domestic furniture in your establishment, if it breaks and someone is injured, you are liable if they take action against you.

The title of this blog may seem odd to your but in North America during the 19^th century, they actually did. Over the course of several years, trees were shaped until the shape resembled a chair then it was used, usually as a dining chair. Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec were fascinated by this concept and that’s how they came up with the Vegetal chair. Much like the plants and trees that it was originally designed on, the chair itself to a long time from the idea to manufacturing, 4 years to be precise.

The cafe chair itself is made from fibre-reinforced polyamide and has an irregular circle shape for the seat. The seat is made up of interweaving branches that are asymmetrical and random like the branches of a tree.

The chair can be an outdoor chair as it is made from polyamide; however will still look great as a café chair or dining chair. Not only this but the chairs are light weight so can be moved around easily and they are stackable chairs so they can be efficiently stored away.

It may seem like these chairs are actually made from a single mould, but you would be wrong. They have been carefully construct because due to its asymmetrical shape, it is very hard to judge how much weight it can take and the chairs true strength.

In the making process the brothers had a hard time creating the dining chair, firstly there were problems the structure, but once this was overcome, they then had problems with the comfort of the chair. The legs to the outdoor chair where also a problem as they needed to be integrated into the design of the chair as well as being strong. However after 4 years, the Vegetal chair was born.

For restaurant owners, Christmas is one of those periods that witness an exceptional amount of foot traffic and restaurant furniture, catering equipment and people find themselves working flat out for the majority of the time.

It has not been easy for any category of business during the last 1 or 2 years with major economies around the world struggling to escape from a major global recession.

The financial pressure put onto any business owner during such times can be at unprecedented levels and that financial prudence may well have demanded that you delay any maintenance and replacement of your ageing restaurant furniture, for example.

The run up to probably the busiest time of your year, however, is not a time for your restaurant furniture to let you down. The possible impact on lost revenue and worst of all, your reputation could last a long time and take some time to recover. If your furniture needs replacing therefore, now could be a good time to get it done.

Don’t forget, manufacturers will have been going though those very same pressures and will be looking to kick start their recovery. They will be making some very special offers through their suppliers, who will again, have negotiated hard to secure the best deals.  At Café Reality, for example, we are continuously running special offers for our customers.
It is most definitely worth exploring what special offers are out there at the moment. If your restaurant furniture is able to make it through New Year, it may be worth investing then to ensure that next year’s profits are up.

When we look around at the chairs today, whether they are café chairs, office chairs, dining chairs or restaurant furniture, we can see a lot of the more designer ones are actually remakes of chairs that were designed 50 years ago. For example many of the chairs made by the Eames brothers in the 50s are still as popular as when they were first manufactured. There chair which is the subject of this blog post however is a chair that can be used for a host of applications. It can be a café chair, a restaurant chair, a meeting room chair or conference chair, even a dining room chair. The chair that I am talking about is the Paulistano chair.

Designed in 1957 by Mendes de Rocha in Sao Paulo Brazil, the chair won the 2006 Priztker Prize for design and has joined the ranks of other furniture items such as the Herman Miller Aeron chair for iconic furniture.

The café chair itself has been made from a single 17ft steel rod that has been bent using 200lbs of hydraulic pressure over 24 hours to make the framework of the chair. This is then welded in just one place and a leather cover made from almost an entire hide is that fitted to the chair to make the seat and back. The great thing about the leather used is that as time goes by, it adds depth and luster and comfort is never compromised. The chair can be easily adjusted by moving the leather sling up and down the frame to create either a slouching seat position or an upright seated position depending on the user’s preference. Due to the chairs quality and design it has become part of the permanent collection in the Museum of Modern Art in New York (MoMA).

When you think of a nest, when I say this I mean bird’s nests, I am pretty sure that you wouldn’t think of a café. There is a designer who has and newly opened this year is a café based on it in Kiev Ukraine. Designer Sergey Makhno created the café called Twister is based on a nest in a rainy tree. The café is unique right down to the café furniture. The sofas and armchairs present although look uncomfortable due to the odd pyramid style texture, are actually very comfy and helps to give the impression of a cosy birds nest.

To further enhance the look of the restaurant the walls have been covered in sticks which give an impression of the interior of a nest. The restaurant also has a bar area as well with bar furniture, much like the restaurant furniture has been made to suit the rest of the cafes look and appeal.

The restaurant is on two levels with the second level having separate pod like areas that you can dine in that is supposed to represent ponds and lakes that further add to this café and restaurants unique design. Just above this are the lights that have been shaped like drops to represent the rain that is falling from the sky. The colours have all been chosen to help the diner feel more relaxed whilst seated in the restaurant where as the bar has little natural light which also emphasizes the feeling of a cosy surrounding.

It was the Eames brothers that first began experimenting with ply wood, and in particular how they can manipulate the wood to follow the contours of the body. You can see how successful they were with this by looking at some of the chairs that they designed over 50 years ago, that are still sold on the market today. A typical example of this is the Lounge chair originally crafted in 1956 and is a design that can still be seen around the world today. Even though this chair is heavily padded, you can see that detail of the frame and that it has been moulded into its unique design. It is not just domestic furniture that the Eames brothers were interested in. They also made café furniture and office furniture also.

It is no wonder then that these to extraordinary designers help to shape the way that we design furniture today. Designer Alfredo Haberli has obviously been inspired by the Eames brothers and you can see this in his latest creation, the Jill chair.

Is it a café chair or dining chair? The answer is both, the Jill chair has been designed to appeal to both commercial and domestic environments. The chair itself can be put alongside café tables or other restaurant furniture or can be used in a dining room; it will not look out of place. The chair comes in 3 different wood finishes, black beech, oak and walnut and also 5 different coloured frames as well. The frame itself has an intricate wire detail that can be resembled to the Wire chair by the Eames brothers. Not only has this but Alfredo has made use of state of the art plywood moulding technology to produce a contemporary and flexible wooden seat. All in all, this chair is a great modern piece of furniture inspired by the great Charles and Ray Eames.

I don’t know about you, but when I think about canteen furniture, I think back to when I was at school and everyone piled into the assembly hall for lunch. We had bog standard polypropylene chairs that were dark grey in colour and standard folding tables with a metal rim that I am sure everyone will remember. The furniture didn’t match or have anything to do with the décor. Nowadays you really can buy canteen furniture that looks great without spending a fortune.

Cafe Reality has a huge range of canteen chairs that will appeal to any environment, whether it be a school hall, exam hall, office canteen or even in a prison canteen, there will be something to suit everyone. Plastic chairs are the most common form of chair that is used within canteens. The reason for this are that they are easy to clean as you just need to wipe them, tamper proof and hard wearing as the chances are they will get a lot of use. A further requirement is that they stack; the reason for this is that usually the canteen space is sometimes used for other things so need to be stored away efficiently. There are huge ranges of bright colours available with these chairs, from orange to blue and yellow to white, so the aesthetics of the room do not need to be compromised.

Tables are also the other main piece of café furniture in a canteen. These tables are usually light weight and can fold away in order to be stored more efficiently. There are now wide ranges of folding tables that are suitable for the canteen. Not only are there a wide range of finish options with different coloured frames as well, but you can actually use a lot of them outdoors for outdoor events and fetes.

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