Repairing an Historic Gustav Stickley Mission Chair
For a number of years, I have had the privilege and opportunity to work with a friend who is an avid collector of furniture from the Arts and Crafts period, roughly 1900 – 1915. Most people refer to the furniture as Arts and Crafts or Mission furniture. Heavy, square and dark, it is plain, without ornamentation – other than the natural beauty of the wood itself. Most of the better pieces of this furniture were made with quartersawn white oak. The growth rings, or medullary rays in the oak are laid-open like a book and are truly stunning. It was an expensive way to make furniture, but it rendered the wood very attractive and beautiful.
Recently, my friend brought me a Gustav Stickley model #367 spindled Morris chair, from 1910. While there were many prominent designers and makers of Arts and Crafts furniture, Gus Stickley’s Craftsman Workshops is generally the most highly regarded of them. Located just outside of Syracuse, in Eastwood, NY, it was in operation from 1901 – 1916. A fine example of Stickley’s many designs, it is an attractive chair.
These chairs were not cheap. This particular model was approximately $33.00 – a lot of money, in 1910! All furniture styles, including early American, Federal and Arts and Crafts furniture tend to go in and out of vogue with different generations.Mission had begun going out of style by 1920. From the 30’s through the 70’s, you couldn’t get much for Mission furniture. Many pieces failed to bring a dime at auction and sadly were cut-up and used as firewood. The second phase of the Mission craze began in 1988, when Barbra Streisand paid $363,000 for Gustav Stickley’s personal sideboard. By 1990, this furniture had come back into vogue, and models like this in good condition, with original finish and essentially left alone, were selling for well over $10,000.
Whenever you alter a classic piece of Arts and Crafts furniture in any way, its value drops dramatically. This particular model had a canvas sling that held the seat cushion. Though there are many models like it still in existence lo, these many years later, most of the canvas slings have ripped out and been replaced. We concurred that the sling, while comfortable, was a bit of a design flaw in terms of durability. The sling is constantly torquing the front and back stretchers inward – trying to break the stretchers, rip the canvas, or both. That is precisely what happened here.
Given that he brings me pieces fairly frequently, I needed to learn a great deal about Mission and Arts & Crafts style furniture, and particularly the original construction techniques. The learning curve has been fun and has allowed me to create pieces of my own that are in the same style (see the Mission Side Table I made, here).
Here is the chair as it was brought to me. It has loads of character, including a place on one of the arms where a previous owner apparently absentmindedly carved a groove with his thumbnail through the years. The chair had suffered the typical catastrophic failure of the front stretcher but he didn’t want to give up on it just yet. He came with pieces in hand and asked if I could make it usable again. A close examination and a bit of head-scratching suggested it could be saved. Here are some photos of the work as it proceeded.
(click on image to enlarge)
This is a photo of the front stretcher that failed. The problem lay with the fact that the front and back stretchers (the pieces that connect the two sides and support the seat) have webbing and canvas strung between them and after years of use, the pulling of this arrangement had weakened the stretcher to the point that it simply broke at the connection point through rotation of the stretcher.
In these pictures, you can see the webbing and canvas support arrangement that caused the stretcher to rotate and fail.
I constructed two new stretchers, front and back, using slightly thicker (and therefore stronger) wood. Research showed that another way Stickley built these chairs was with wood slats rather than the canvas and webbing. Given that the slats would not only offer support for the seat, but also serve as a preventative to the rotational forces, it was decided to eschew the fabric and use slats. The slats would sit on a ledger on both stretchers, as seen below.
Finally, slats were made and installed to provide the support for the seat cushion. I determined the angle of the seat in relation to the back by raising and lowering the rear ledger, and then asking my friend to sit in it for the feel that he was familiar with – a butt test, if you will!
Here is the completed project showing the new front stretcher and slats in place.
This was a character chair, and still is – as the finish is original, and the repairs are all hidden. The value is not there as a result of several repairs but my friend doesn’t care. He likes the chair. A favorite chair is like a home, a shelter, where one can go for recreation (in the original sense of the word – to re-create oneself). It was and still is a character chair with its original surface after 110 years! I enjoy doing projects such as these. I learn a lot about furniture making techniques, and there is a certain satisfaction to be gleaned from bringing a badly broken old chair back to life – perhaps for another 100 years, or more!