Front cover image for The chair : rethinking culture, body, and design

The chair : rethinking culture, body, and design

"A provocative look at one of our most common cultural artifacts, this book reveals the history, physiology, and politics of how and why we sit the way we do - and others don't." "Perhaps no other object of our daily environment has had the enduring cultural significance of the ever-present chair, unconsciously yet forcefully shaping the social and physical dimensions of our lives. With over ninety illustrations, Galen Cranz's The Chair traces the varied history of the chair as we know it from its crudest beginnings in the Neolithic Age up through the modern ergonomic office. Drawing on anecdotes, literary references, and famous designs, she documents our ongoing love affair with the chair - despite its potentially harmful effects on our bodies." "Part social commentary, part design history, and part manifesto for a new way of living, this book brings a critical and delightfully astute eye to the place where we spend most of our waking lives."--Jacket
Print Book, English, 1998
W.W. Norton, New York, 1998
Books
288 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm
9780393046557, 9780393319552, 0393046559, 0393319555
37966294
Why Do We Use Chairs? How Chairs Evolved
The Elements of Style
What's Wrong with the Chair? An Ergonomic Perspective
A Body-Mind Perspective
Toward Body-Conscious Design
The Chair Reformed
Beyond Interior Design