What is Thonet?
Thonet is the name of the German-Austrian furniture maker Michael Thonet (1796-1871) and of the company Gebrüder Thonet, which became famous for furniture made from steam-bent solid beech. Thonet developed a method of bending wood with steam and letting it dry in moulds, so that it kept its graceful curves. This made it possible to produce chairs in large numbers from a few bent parts, instead of from many separate, hand-jointed pieces.
Chair No. 14
The best-known Thonet chair is chair No. 14 from 1859, also known as the Viennese café chair. It consists of a small number of bent wooden parts joined with screws and nuts. As a result, the chair could be taken apart and shipped compactly, an early example of flat-pack furniture. It became a standard in cafés and restaurants and is still in production.
Significance for design and building
- Industrial production: Thonet showed how a craft product could be made in series using moulds and standardised parts.
- Steam bending: the technique is still used for chairs, stair handrails and curved mouldings.
- Modernism: around 1930, Thonet also produced tubular steel furniture by designers such as Marcel Breuer and Mart Stam.
Steam bending wood yourself: rules of thumb
- Use straight-grained wood, preferably green or air-dried. Beech, ash and oak bend well; kiln-dried wood breaks more easily.
- Support the outside of the bend with a steel strap, so that the fibres on that side do not tear.
- Let the bent wood dry in the mould before removing it, otherwise it will spring back.
Related terms
- Steaming timber
- Art Nouveau
- Bauhaus
- Architectural style
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