Navy Chair Aluminum

The Navy Chair was developed by Emeco (Electrical Machine and Equipment Company) as one of its first commissions. The US Navy was looking for a chair which, although simple in itself, had to meet quite demanding requirements: light and stable (meaning able to withstand the rough handling of sailors), rustproof, fireproof and seaworthy - in other words, virtually indestructible. The result, the aluminum Navy Chair, did indeed meet almost all requirements - as an "unimpeachable symbol of no-nonsense American ingenuity", as Emeco itself described its own invention. But the success and longevity of the Navy Chair confirmed this view, and so Emeco has been producing the chair at its headquarters in Hanover, Pennsylvania, since 1944.
After an economic downturn, Gregg Buchbinder took over the company in 1998 and, thanks to collaborations with renowned architects and designers such as Philip Starck, Jasper Morrison and Norman Foster, got it back on track with a strong focus on conserving resources. The Navy Chair, which has since become an iconic chair and remains the company's flagship, began its civilian career in hotels, restaurants and private homes. As in 1944, the chair is still produced from recycled aluminum today, which reduces its carbon footprint to just under a quarter of what would be required for the same chair made from new aluminum.

All individual parts of the Navy Chair are made of aluminum. Aluminum is light, stable, fireproof, non-corrosive, non-magnetic and antibacterial. It was therefore the material of choice when developing the 1006 Navy Chair. In addition, aluminum can be recycled an infinite number of times, which was necessary in times of war due to scarce resources and is necessary today in order to conserve resources: Recycling aluminum saves 95 percent of the energy that would be used to produce the same amount of aluminum from scratch. However, the material does have one drawback: processing it into chairs of this quality is immensely time-consuming, not to mention completely impractical. Unless, of course, you want a chair that will last forever - like this one. The lifespan of the Navy Chair is estimated at 150 years, which more than compensates for the production costs.

In 77 manual steps, the individual parts of the chair are assembled and welded together over the entire length of the joints to create a solid unit - without any fastening elements. All welded seams are ground perfectly smooth for a flush appearance. This meticulous finish is one of the ways in which you can tell that this is a genuine Navy Chair from Emeco. After brushing the surface (this is also done by hand), each chair undergoes a heat treatment and is first immersed in a 516 °C salt bath, then "baked" overnight in a special oven. This process was developed by Emeco to make the chair as stable as the US Navy had originally requested. This is because it makes the aluminum, which is rather soft in its pure form, three times harder than steel. Finally, the surface is anodized, i.e. converted into aluminium oxide, making it extremely durable and almost as hard as diamond.