This height-adjustable swivel armchair is an example of the lightweight aluminium furniture designed and manufactured by Warren McArthur. Based on the label beneath the seat indicating the company’s showroom at One Park Avenue, New York City, the example shown here was manufactured after 1936, either at the company’s factory in Rome, New York, or in Bantam, Connecticut (beginning in 1938).
Like many of McArthur’s designs, the Adjustable Armchair is constructed of tubular aluminium rails and stretchers connected by cylindrical caps, a system McArthur developed and patented between 1930 and 1936. The armchair rests on a swivelling four-spoke aluminium pedestal base. An adjustable headrest is situated at the top of the back. McArthur designed this and similar models for barbershops and hair salons, where swivel bases were common. A advertisement touts the chair’s distinctive features: ‘light weight; absence of exposed screws and nuts; permanent untarnishable surface; and imperishable colors’.
Text: David Raizman
