Fjoon Chair

• Prize
  Winner in Dining chair
• Company/Firm
  Fernweh Woodworking
• Designer
  Justin Nelson
• Lead Designer(Other)
  Aaron Johnson, Alex Collins
• Photo Credit
  Benjamin Edwards
• Location
  Bend, OR
• Project Date
  May 15, 2023
• Project Link
  view
• Web URL
  view

The Fjoon (pr. fyoon) chair rose out of a multi-year obsession with high end upholstery as well as an infatuation with wood joinery and principles of chair strength from the broader chair-making community, especially windsor chair makers. For this design, I also wanted to capture a feeling of minimalism that has aspects of subtle extravagance. My musings led me to include what are now a few of my favorite aspects of fjoon - 1) a compound curved upholstered seat; 2) wedged mortise and tenon joinery; 3) select upholstery materials of the highest quality; and 4) a patent-pending wood plug system allowing for disassembly and re-upholstery if needed. Each chair comes with an aluminum key placed in a stitched pocket on the bottom of the seat to allow for dissasembly. We developed this system as a way to encourage fixing the furniture if it ever becomes damaged, as opposed to disposal and replacement.

Our woodworking team also appreciates that each chair includes all three standard methods of creating curved wooden parts - steam bending, bent lamination, and shaping.

Bio
Justin founded Fernweh Woodworking in 2015 in Bend, OR. He developed the Sling Chair and Tripod Table in 2017, a process sparking his desire to develop a line of handcrafted furniture. The Oxbend and Fjoon Collections arrived in 2020 and 2023; Fernweh Woodworking now offers furniture for every room in a house. Justin studied business at Purdue University and joined the Marine Corps, deploying on an advisory team for Afghan Police. After joining a hotshot fire crew in OR, he took up woodworking.