Saturday, August 22, 2009 Well-Made Dining Chairs from Jessica Charles

We were shopping for some dining chairs for a client the other day and we were surprised to see how much shoddy stuff is out there. Really. If you can pick an upholstered chair up with one hand it usually means it's not that well-made. In our experience, with most upholstered furniture, the more substantial it feels the better it is made. Solid furniture is made with solid wood, well-padded seat and sturdy construction.

So with that in mind, we recommend that if you are looking for high-quality dining chairs, take a look at Jessica Charles. It's a small division of Hancock & Moore, a very prestigious furniture maker in North Carolina. The style of Jessica Charles slants toward the more classic side, although they have introduced more modern designs of late.

Here are some samples:








The chairs are not cheap. They run about $650-800 per chair, but we think they are worth it.

To see the entire collection, visit Jessica Charles web site.

Modern Office Accessories

We were looking for something cool for our desk the other day, and let's face it, Staples is really not the place to go for stuff like that.

So we were thrilled to see a line called Prestige Identity at the LA Mart. Despite the boring name, it is actually a very hip European company specializing in modern gifts and accessories.

Take a look at some of our favorites:

This is actually a bookmark.

A magnetic for paperclips.
Don't you love these photo holders?
This is a USB card holder. Elephant bookends.

Most of the items are quite reasonable. You can buy them directly on the Prestige Identity web site.

Thursday, August 20, 2009 Glamorous Furniture from Julian Chichester

We first saw Julian Chichester furniture about 10 years ago. At that time the line was really small and very quirky; it still is.

An English company, Julian Chichester furniture has that glamorous-but-not-too-chi-chi quality about it. Ten years later, they are still around so they must be doing something right.

Take a look:

You can see the full catalog here.

At this time we do not have pricing information yet, our apologies. If you need assistance, email us we'll be happy to contact the company for you. Just know that it's quite pricey...