As I mentioned in It set me thinking............. 14.03.2010 and VICTORAN FURNITURE 13.04.2010 I am fascinated by the construction of the 'Sussex Chair' made by Morris & Co., and its traditional, country forebear.

It is not difficult to introduce great strength into a chair's legs, even if the chair is of light or delicate construction. - By the introduction of stretchers (those members that join one leg to another beneath the seat) it turns the structure into a 'box' in the sense that it is supported on all four of its sides.

It is also easy to make the back of a chair strong by the simple device of making it an extension of its back legs.

But to introduce strength into the arm structure of a chair of delicate construction - like the Sussex Chair and its forebear - is not so easy as, for the obvious reason that it has to be sat in, it can only be supported on three sides.

As you can see both chairs have stretcher systems beneath their seats.....

.....and also in both chairs, their backs are a continuation of their back legs.

In the country chair, above, you will note that the arm is dowelled into the back and its upright member is dowelled into the underside of the arm.
The upright member is then screwd into both the seat rail and the top stretcher beneath it.

This was not (is not) a robust fixing and it is not surprising that it failed.

The stress on the arms was inevitably going to be outward pressure by the seated occupants of the chair and screws, as mechanical fixings, are not suited to securing members that are going to be subject to repetitive movements.

I suggest that whomever it was who developed the Sussex Chair from its country forebear - whether that was Ford Madox Brown, William Morris himself or Philip Webb, the cheif designer at Morris & Co. - spotted this structural flaw in the 'country chair' and came up with a subtle but brilliant modification.

In the Sussex Chair the upright arm member, whilst still dowelled into the underside of the arm, passes through the seat member and is then dowelled into the upper side of a strategically positioned cross stretcher.
This system affords the arms enormous resistance to lateral pressure by comparison to the screw fixings of the country chair.

In my view, when something has true functional purpose it adds to the appearance of the item.

There you are - there are probably few other people in the world who get excited about the structural details of chairs - but that's me for you!!