A Lunch Hour Snag

This week I’m on the road visiting family and finding some amazing things that I can’t wait to share with you next week. Although I enjoy driving for hours and hundreds of miles to thrift in unfamiliar lands, a lunch hour thrift store visit last week reminded me that sometimes the gold lies right beneath your feet. About 10 minutes from my office I found all this.

Six fantastic brushed aluminum Emeco chairs. Originally designed and built for office buildings and institutions, these chairs have a really cool industrial look, never rust and weigh less than half what Steelcase chairs do.

During WWII, the US Navy challenged Emeco, the Electrical Machine and Equipment Company, to create a sturdy chair that could withstand a salty, damp environment. Their answer was the 1006 chair, often called the “Navy” chair. These variants are known as semi-upholstered Navy chairs (model 1011 with arms and 1022 without).

The chairs were introduced in 1944; these examples were made in the early 1960s. All of these are still available from Emeco today with only slight variations to the swivel base. Learn all about the 77 steps that go into making a Navy chair on the Emeco website.

I’ll have to strip off some of the yellowed clear coat on mine, but I snagged the entire bunch for less than $30. If you’d prefer new, however, be prepared to cough up around $1,000 each!