apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

The Quin looks like it's more comfortable for a living room - and it's gorgeous. I would do it in a mustard color.

I think the Quinn chair would look lovely with your currently owned items. Stricking color and soft lines. Good job.

I second the vote of the quinn chair in a mustard color-- that would be gorgeous! And mustard would be a good "pop" color for this room.

I don't love the Real Good chairs as much. They look a bit cold and uncomfortable...

I love the Quinn chair and my husband and I were thinking of getting it ourselves. I think it would definitely look nice with what you have. Room and Board has some nice print upholstery that might work well since everything in the room seems to be solid colors

As for the Real Good chair, I don't know. It's not really my style, but I suppose it would work. It just doesn't look very comfortable to me.

I have the same couch and I bought the grace chair in charcoal also from Room & Board - similar to Quinn.

they look great together...

Love Quinn, don't love the dining chair option. What about the something with a boxier look? Something about that chair, it looks like packing material like its temproary and disposable.

The room has lots of wood and fabric, the plastic jars with it.

What about vintage chairs?

I actually think the Quinn in the pictured color could look great.

This is good 411:

I ordered the Quinn chairs in November of last year...am still waiting for them to come and it has been 3 months. The store have been giving me one email update after another regarding its delay...first it was scheduled for end of Jan., followed by mid Feb., and then now end of March...(keeping my fingers crossed that it won't be next Thanksgiving before i get the chairs).

I am a fan of the Quinn chairs, however, note that with R&B you may end up waiting for them for as long as i have.

Callbob - I ordered a quinn chair this morning on the R&B website! I guess I shouldn't expect it to come on March 11th like it said on my order :(

I love the Quinn chair for your space. The legs would be a nice match to sofa, and it's a nice accompaniment to what you already have going on.

I was originally thinking a soft gray would go nice, but if you have the guts for it the mustard would be spectacular. Yellow was never my favorite color though and I think I would personally tire of it, but that's probably just me.

I like DahliaCactus' suggestion of vintage. Some nice danish modern ones might work perfectly if you have the time to dig around for them.

from someone who used to work in a furniture store, the delay in your chair may be due to the fabric availability. So Gravity's Rainbow, yours may not be the same delay as Callbobs and it sounds like the store is at least good about communicating updates.

You definately need more comfortable looking dining chairs - I'd hate to sit on those Blu-Dot chairs for too long...

How about the Garvey upholstered dining armchairs from West Elm in Cinnabar (Orange)?
http://www.westelm.com/online/store/ProductDisplay?partNumber=WE-PRODf523&storeId=17001&langId=-1&catalogId=17002&viewSetCode=E&parentId=WE-SH1FRNDIB&retainNav=true&cmsrc=WE-SH1FRNDIB

For the Quinn Chair, I'd go back to the store and choose the Bezel Spice fabric
http://www.roomandboard.com/rnb/collection.do?method=get&id=92329716&cat=91552822
- it's a standard/stocked color and brings in more Orange that would look great in that room.

I agree with everyone who likes the Quinn. If you plan on sticking with a similar color scheme for a while I think the mustard would look great, but if you want something more versatile a grey would be nice.

I think the BluDot chairs would work in your space, but they do look uncomfortable. Have you tried them out?

I just received my room and board loring couch in a similar shade of blue. I have an accent chair in a print with golden and persimmion shades, and I'm shopping for a small-profile chair in butterscotch leather. So I agree with the guidance to go with golden or reddish colors. I can't tell if your sofa has a yellow undertone to the blue or not. If it's a true cool blue, use reds with a blue undertone; if warm, use reds that lean towards tomato (yellow undertone).

Great accents in this palette are chocolate to bronze brown, honey-golden to saffron yellow, and taupe to camel. I would avoid true mustard or true pumpkin for upholstery, carpet, or curtains -- IMO, those colors were wrong in the 70s and are still wrong. :-) Nice accents though. For window treatments, go with a neutral linen or flax color. I would layer with an off-white/ivory sheer for dimension and texture.

And then I'd use prints in the carpet and pillows. Or maybe a funky printed light shade.

Have fun! I'm doing my entire house and while it's taking forever, it's a blast!

looking at your room, I think everything would tie together wonderfully if you added a bit more of the blue couch color and white.

A chair in either white or beige with accessories in that couch blue and white (pillows, vases, drapes)?

hope thie helps!

I agree with bepsf on the bezel spice for the Quinn, but also check out the bezel celedon!

Also, if you're not worried about too much soiling, the digit natural is nice.

Room & Board lost a huge amount of their upholstery fabric last year, not sure if it was one supplier or several. They've been very upfront about this and the delays it has caused, so I'm surprised it wasn't mentioned to you, callbob.

I think the Quinn will look great in your room, Sarah. I think any of the solid fabrics could look good, depending on what colors you want to bring in - and what shade the paint is, it's hard to tell ffrom the picture.

The Real Good chairs look very uncomfortable to me, personally. Steel! Sharp edges! Ouch!

I'd do dining chairs that relate more to the Eames chairs... but not Eames chairs.

I'd pick the Jake chairs in blue...
http://www.roomandboard.com/rnb/product.do?method=get&id=877261&coll=377418&cat=42

But I'd do two upholstered arm chairs for the head and "foot" of the table.

For a living room armchair, I like the Quinn but seriously vote no for the red, or any warm color, for that matter. If you are worried about matchy-matchy, I'd stick to an olive green, or a pattern that does reference some of the colors you have already. Too dissimilar, and you end up looking like a furniture showroom. And not in a good way.

And while you are focused on the chairs, maybe go pillow shopping, as a pillow you love may indicate which color route to take with your chair.

PS: Are you here in NYC?

P2, that dining chair a good choice. And a good price! Interesting that they have relegated it to the Kids section.

Ah, you are welcome, but ooops, I may have linked to the Kids version, but search for "Jake" on the R&B site for the same thing "supersized." The price is not that much more.

Hey everybody,

Thanks so much for your help with our room! Sorry for the novel here, but I want to respond to your good ideas...

First off, I'm glad to hear that folks think the Quinn armchair will work, style-wise. (I really like it, but I wasn't sure.)

For those who suggested a mustard color, I'm intrigued--that's much more bold that I would have thought. However, the chair doesn't come in any yellow shade, and facing that giant wall of fabric swatches and attempting to make my own custom choice fills me with dread.

The stripey Bezel fabric is very cool, but wouldn't it look weird with the rug? The picture makes the rug look rather washed out, but in person it is nicer (I think)--but it also has a random narrow multi-colored stripe pattern going on.

Honestly, the natural color was my inclination, but I worry about dirt, and also thought it might be boring.

Hmm. Guess I still have some thinking to do on this.

Regarding the dining chairs: well, I guess no one loves the BluDot ones, huh?

Here's what happened, actually...I got the new FLOR catalog and saw them pictured there, and thought "Oh! Those are kinda cool and unexpected, yet somehow reminiscent of the Eames fiberglass chairs I'd get if I didn't already have 2 Eames chairs in the room."

So, the communal advice is that light blue chairs would work, but not those? I definitely considered a) vintage chairs (but so hard to know via Ebay or whatever whether different wood tones will work together ) and b) parsons-type chairs, a la the Garvey recommended above (but I worried that they would be too visually heavy and block the light). Sigh. Guess I gotta keep lookin'.

(Finally, no, this place is not in NY. I'm a NYer in exile, these days...this is in Colorado, of all places.)

Thanks again so much for your help! This site is great!

Best,
Sarah

Before we get ahead of ourselves, have you visited a Blu Dot retailer and/or Room and Board and sat in the proposed chairs for a period of time? If not, you need to make the trip to the stores and test out these chairs, never buy a chair sight unseen. Bring something to read, your partner, and carefully examine whether the chairs you think you like are comfortable. During the same visit, compare the chair to other chairs in the store. This is very important as one can easily fall in love with a chair that is pretty yet uncomfortable, eventually dooming it to become a large, fabric covered sculpture.

Before I would buy any chair, I would visit a number of retailers and make comparisons to make sure that the proposed chair was the most comfortable I could afford. Yes, this is time consuming, but keep in mind you will be sitting on these chairs every day for years to come. After you make the selection, then worry about fabric textures and colors.

Make sure your backside doesn't regret your purchase.

Just curious, but do y'all sit in a restaurant chair before you commit to dinner there?

How many times have you actually been somewhere at dinner and the comfort of the dining chair has become an issue?

I think the whole "sit in it first" when so many sources are internet these days, just adds to purchase angst.

And as far as the Quinn, to me what makes chairs and sofas work together is seat height. If they are similar, you can make a huge range of styles work.

Is this a rental? If not, paint that wood trim.
If it is a rental, make drapes your next priority to cover some of that wood window trim.

And here's the chair I'd do for head of table, with the Jakes...
the Sarrinen upholstered chair:
http://hivemodern.com/products/?view=sub_product&sid=1285&cid=2&cid2=104

As far as pattern and pattern (rug to Bezel fabric) as long as they share some similar color story, and if the scale of the stripes is either VERY similar or very DISsimilar, you should be fine. But yeah, there is sort of an art to making patterns work.

If you are worried about too many chairs, you could also use the two Saarinens as living room chairs, pull them into the dining room when you need 'em.

PS: Since you have so many pieces already, I think you need to make sure any additional introductions share *something* in common with whatever you already have... in color, material, or shape. They don't need to share *all* these things in common, but should share one. Or they could share one thing in common with more than one piece.

So for example, you could get an angular (like the sofa) leather (like the ottoman) chair for the dining chairs.

You'll get cohesion without matchy-matchiness.

I agree with the "sit in it first" camp. At least, I wouldn't personally buy something I haven't sat in. My most successful furniture purchases have been when I see something in person and fall in love with it or can fully visualize it. Even case goods, I like to be able to scope out first. My problems shopping online are: too many options and not enough multi-sensory experience. But, that's my opinion.

Sarah, I wouldn't criticize your design sense so much! I think you've done a good job so far. I think P2's suggestion for either painting the window trim or adding window coverings is spot on. I don't have any other color suggestions--though I think some white parsons chairs would really "pop" nicely in the dining room as well as in an armchair. I'm a big fan of white and ivory, though...

I guess I really haven't run into any "painful" chairs in, well, ever, really, so I guess I am not that gunshy, especially with so many e-tailers having fairly decent return policies. I also think a "quick sit" in a store is not that telling, really.

But I am also sort of average height. I could see the issue if one were much taller or much shorter.