June’s chair of the month is this joined chair made in South Lancashire or Cheshire 1685-1720, at least 100 years before High Wycombe’s Windsor chair making industry was established.

Joined chairs are made by fixing the wood together with joints such as mortice and tenons. Windsor chairs use turned, stick-like back and leg parts that are fixed into holes in the seat. See our article What Is A Windsor Chair?  for more about on Windsor chairs.

Most of the chairs held by Wycombe Museum are from the High Wycombe area, but a few, like this one, are from other English chair making regions. Each chair making region shares design and making characteristics. Find out more about Reginal Furniture with the Regional Furniture Society.

Museum staff are in the process of adding chair records to Wycombe Museum’s selection of online records with the help of funding from the Regional Furniture Society. This chair is one of the new additions. You can search the records at the link below.

Search Our Chair Collection

Chair of the month for May is this smoker’s bow Windsor chair made by Stephen Hazell in Oxford.

Smoker’s bow chairs are a type of low-backed Windsor chair and probably got their name because the arms are the perfect height to support the elbows of someone smoking a pipe.

Most of the chairs held by Wycombe Museum are from the High Wycombe area, but a few, like this one, are from the wider Chilterns / Thames Valley area – one of the six main chair making regions of England. Each chair making region shares design and making characteristics. Find out more about Regional Furniture with the RFS link in the blue box below.

Museum staff are in the process of adding chair records to Wycombe Museum’s selection of online records with the help of funding from the Regional Furniture Society. This chair is one of the new additions. You can search the records below.

Search Our Chair Collection

Chair of the Month for March is even smaller than last month’s Chair of the Month!

It’s a miniature chair about 6cm high, made by High Wycombe manufacturer Nicholls and Janes in 1922. It’s a duplicate of the furniture set they made for the Queen Mary Doll’s House, which is displayed at Windsor Castle.

Nicholls and Janes took over the buildings of Widgington’s, the first factory in High Wycombe, and number 3 of the 8 sites on our ‘Here, Chair & Everywhere’ heritage walking trail. See Chairmaking Town Trail • Wycombe Museum for more information on the trail and to download a guide.

The guide includes more information on Nicholls and Janes, Widgington and other important town centre furniture sites. Look out for the new trail boards in town, including the former Nicholls and Janes site near Bucks New University.

Chair of the Month is a partnership between Wycombe Museum and the Regional Furniture Society.

Our Chair of the Month for February is this beautiful child’s chair made in Rockley, Nottinghamshire around 1835-1850. It is just 68cm high and is made from yew, elm and ash woods. At first glance it looks very like Windsor chairs from the High Wycombe area. Without the ‘Nicholson Rockley’ stamp behind the seat, how could we know that it was not local to High Wycombe? There are some design differences to look out for.

The easiest to spot is that with chairs from Nottinghamshire, the bow back (curved back piece) tapers before it joins the arm or seat. In chairs from High Wycombe, it doesn’t. Compare this chair to our Chair of the Month from October 2024 to see what we mean.

Learn more about how to identify locally made Windsor chairs as well as other ‘Chair Expert’ tips in Wycombe Museum’s recently upgraded Chair Galleries.

Chair of the Month for December is this church chair. It was made for Birmingham Cathedral by Glenisters of High Wycombe in about 1865. It has a book rack, hassock (kneeler) rack, hat, and umbrella rack.

 This chair can be seen in the Chair Lab, in the chair galleries at Wycombe Museum

Chair of the Month for November was made by Robert Prior of Uxbridge, around 1820-1840. It is one of a set of five – one armchair and four ‘side’ chairs. They all have triple splats with Prince of Wales feather designs, and all use best yew-wood with elm seats.

This chair can be seen in the Art Gallery at Wycombe Museum.

Watch this space for news on our planned new chair store which will be open to visitors to explore.

Chair of the Month for October is the Jessop Chair.

It is a typical Wycombe-made Wheelback Windsor chair, made in about 1840. It has an elm seat, beech legs and ash bow. Unusually, it has a label under the seat with the retailer’s name – A Jessop. Ann Jessop was a retailer based in Sheffield in the 1840s. This char is one of many that was made in High Wycombe but sold much further away. Traveling salesmen, took chairs on heavily laden wagons from Wycombe factories to shops and retailers in the midlands and north.

This chair can be seen in the history galleries at Wycombe Museum. It is Object 8 in ‘A History of Wycombe in 10 Objects’.

Chair of the Month for September is this scroll back Windsor armchair.

The type of 3 ring turning on the leg dates it to about 1870-1900. At some point in its history, it was painted white, and then later stripped. Traces of the white paint remain.

In the collection at Wycombe Museum there are even more wonderful chairs than we are able to display at any one time. This chair, together with many others in Wycombe Museum’s collection has been stored in poor environmental conditions which resulted in a small proportion of chairs developing surface mould growth.

We are grateful to have received grant funding from the Regional Furniture Society, Heart of Bucks, and additional support from Buckinghamshire Council. This means that our stored collection has now been removed from the damp stores, slowly dried, and cleaned.  Our fabulous chairs and the rest of our stored collection continues to be preserved for future generations to enjoy!

Watch this space for news on our planned new chair store which will be open to visitors to explore.