given that I have a small(er) potato on the way, I have been investigating nursery furniture. I have always, always coveted an eames RAR/herman miller fiberglass shell rocking chair, and now have the perfect reason to have one.
My question is for those of you who may already own one - and may have actually used them when you had a young child - do you find them ergonmically comfortable/functional?
Most new parents I know go for the padded gliders that, while I know how cushy they feel, are about as fugly of a chair as I can imagine putting in my home. Advice?
Hahaha....My husband bought me the Eames rocker when I got my architect's license. It was a combination "You're a real architect/you're ready to have a baby now" gift! He bought it because a friend of his said it was "the best nursing chair ever!" She is about 5'-3", 100 pounds.
For context: I'm 5'-8", 135-ish pounds, and for me it was *just* uncomfortable enough, and I mean that in a good way. It was perfect for nursing - baby was (with a Boppy pillow) at just the right height, and I could use the armrests. It also worked great for reading stories and cuddling and everything else you want to do with baby.
I'm happy, however, that it was not comfortable enough for sleeping. I didn't use a footrest, which might have changed things. When I sit in one of those gliders with my feet up, my comment is always the same"If I'd had this chair, I would have spent every night sleeping in it and never slept in my own bed - it's too comfortable!" I did, on occasion, doze off in the rocker with the baby in my arms, but never for more than an hour or so.
I recommend the Eames rocker - it looks cool, doesn't take up too much space, you'll actually use it in the living room later, it functions great, and...
Warning: following sentence not for the squeamish!
...the sprayed breast milk cleans off it really easily. Big bonus!
oddly enough breast milk cleanup never entered my thoughts
when i bought mine...
it is pretty comfy to sit in...probably hard to fall asleep in because
of the low back even with your feet up. i think it also depends on
your size...although i'm 6'-1" and it still fits me pretty well.
thanks lb-that is the kind of testimonial I was looking for. I'm a bit taller than you and thought the armrests/backrests would be too low, and my husband is taller yet. I realize I might be accused of vanity by not opting for the cushy/ugly glider. But I see your point of the shell being just comfortable enough for this purpose. I expect that if my husband buys me a glider, I would want to dispose of it once we no longer need nursery furniture, and the RAR will be welcome in my home for the duration.
btw, the breastmilk wipe-up - good call, hadn't thought about that yet!
well this topic digressed pretty fast - what was I thinking...that talking about a chair could possibly compete with the notion of breastmilk. They're just boobs afterall.
You get used to it all...once you have kids, misdirected breastmilk is by far the least offensive liquid (or substance, lets say) that you will be covered in.
Potatoes, my wife and I got the least expensive ugly white framed/blue cushioned glider we could, knowing that it would not stay forever. She used it as the primary nursing spot for our daughter (now 4) and we then went on to do alot of her nighttime reading in that chair. It is now in our 4month old son's room, although it seems that most of the nursing happens elsewhere now. The chair will not find another use here in our home once its function stage ends, so if you can find something like the Eames that will serve you beyond baby/toddler rocking, that is great.
Sorry I do not have first hand experience with that Eames rocking chair.
I would love to find a vintage one, but after some searching it's clear that I can only afford a reproduction-potentially at a discount wholesale rate from a local HM dealer. Even at that price I will have to lobby for choosing the Eames over the cushy glider. If anyone sees a deal (under 350) I would love to know about it.
My wife and I really wanted to use the birth of our some as an excuse to buy and Eames fiberglass rocker but we found that for us it just didn't work well - there is no head rest.
I spend many a night up both rocking my son in the chair and also sitting in his room waiting for him to fall asleep so I could leave and I'm glad we ended up with something I could try and fall asleep in. We bought an inexpensive Ikea thing that we would not feel bad giving away.
white on white makes a similar chair..but if you have something
against the knockoffs you might not want it...although i think they
sell for 150 or so...so it's not much even if you wanted to get rid
of it later...and they're virtually the same as the vintage one i do
have. it may be worth it until you find a real one...i found the one
i think is an original at a street sale..but it cost me 400.
Not trying to side track but I thought Modernica had the original molds and still uses fiberglass??? Isn't there some issue where Modernica gets around paying royalty the Eames foundation - maybe a good reason not to support them too... I don't know for sure.
The new Herman Miller chairs use a thermoplastic or something that is just not a nice in my eyes. The plastic feels cheep too.
thanks lars-I will have to spend some time on that website after work. i am not a purist, nor do I have the budget to aspire to be one, so I will keep my eye open for a used one or perhaps grab one of these affordable reproductions...curious if anyone can explain or compare the Modernica repro's to whiteonwhite or others....
If i had a beautiful vintage chair, I would probably fuss over the baby mess potential anyway.
what about formula? Doesnt anyone use that anymore? i know when I was a kid breast feeding was not popular. My sister has 3 kids, 6 mo., 2, and 4 and there entire house is sticky and shit all over. i dont know how people live like that. Brave souls indeed.
I am an 20C furniture nut, and the eames rocker is gorgeous. I don't have little ones yet, but friends with little ones have come over and sat down in our eames rocker and have commented on how comfortable it is for rocking a child to sleep etc.
I purchased an original HM shell on Ebay (fiberglass butterscotch color) and teamed it with an reproduction base (not from Modernica, you can get much cheaper, sturdier ones on Ebay). All up, including shipping, the total cost was just about $300. Craigslist is also a goodie for bargains, particularly if you're in California. Its very hard and expensive to find a vintage rocker base (that is sturdy enough for you to sit on), and the fiberglass shell is the component that had the Herman Miller stamp on it, not the bases.
oOO, then you can team it with a colorful Maharam Alexander Girard cushion!!
ah, the formula vs. breastfeeding debate. Recently the gov't decided to support the formula industry over the health of our nation's infants and required public service announcements to be watered down. Essentially the medical community has decided that breastmilk was ALWAYS the healthiest, most beneficial choice, and the industry feels a drop in profit margin, so dubya to the rescue. I will be returning to work, so a year on the boob is not an option for me completely, but any duration of natural feeding is beneficial if possible.
I was raised on formula, and I turned out fine (easy to say on a discussion bd, I know). But I hate the notion of a corporation telling me their product is the best for my child if the truth is that natural is best, and they just want to make $ off me.
antipodean - thanx I will check out buying shell/base separately.
we were given a dutailier glider as a gift - it was a bent-wood version in clear maple ply that i don't see on their website anymore - too bad - it was the only one we found that we would allow in the house. super comfy....
I knew someone who worked for facilities management at a government facility in Northern California. He pulled two beautiful Eames fiberglass chairs with cats-cradle bases out of the dumpster at work...he then went on to describe to me the couch that was slated for the trash; an Eames sofa compact
My archi friends went to an used furniture auction, and bid on 2 caramel leather HM eames soft pad task chairs. No one else wanted them, so they took them home for...$50 each. New they sell them for a few $ grand down under.
why's it called breast milk, we don't call cow's milk udder milk ... curious. I'm a bachelor, and own one in white. I can say it's also great for certain pre-natal activities too ... kidding. It mostly holds my unfolded laundry these days.
Breast milk has all kinds of things that come directly from the mother's body and can't be manufactured: antibodies, the things that prevent allergies, enzymes, etc. And, since the taste of breast milk changes depending on the mother's diet, babies are getting exposed to all kinds of flavors and alternative foodstuff that they don't get from eating the same formula day after day (In theory this would lead to less picky eaters, but that's not true with mine!).
That said, formula isn't BAD for a baby. It's good for them, and if a child can't nurse, for whatever reason, formula is absolutely the best choice.
Also, ANY amount of breast milk is good for a child, so even if you can nurse for only a month, a week, or a day, it's beneficial. I was breastfed for six weeks (my mom was a hippie and took a LOT of flak for this from her conservative family) and I breastfed Angus for just over a year, while working - he also got formula and started solids at 5 months.
This is why I love Archinect - we can talk about breast function and chair design in the same thread....
i can think of lots of rockers who are resistant to breast milk and kids.
our pediatric nurse once suggested using breast milk for eye infections. our oldest-daughter infant developed some eye infection so a couple of drops of breast milk in the kid's eye and voila - back to normal in about 12-18 hours. seriously, the anti-biotic properties of the stuff are amazing.
congrats steven - though to be honest - i'm really glad we're almost rid of sippy cups in our house now.
Modernica actually goes thru the trouble of grinding away the bolt holes / geometry from the bottom of the Authentic Herman-Miller shell and (cold) welding their own to receive their own knock off bases, rendering them somewhat worthless as an antique. Beware, as there are alot of them floating around the vintage Mod market. From a functional standpoint, though, it's a cheap alternative if you can an old shell and take it to them.....they'll even paint it whatever color you want or swap it for one they've got in your color (at least that's what they used to do for us poor gleaners) Back in the day, Zeeland, Michigan has those dang non-biodegradable shells laying around just about everywhere...ahh, the days of pre-post-post-modernism.
Thanks to this thread I am ordering a (Vitra/Herman Miller/Eames) RAR in moss on black base for my new-born nephew. Rather than the crate of port or the silver spoon, or the donation to the fund, or baby clothes, I thought my sister could use it and I could subtly turn my barely conscious nephew into a furniture fetishist. Nice.
does anyone else have an opinion on the newer plastic version? (we were thinking of going the cheap glider route but i would like to avoid that if possible.)
Eames RAR
given that I have a small(er) potato on the way, I have been investigating nursery furniture. I have always, always coveted an eames RAR/herman miller fiberglass shell rocking chair, and now have the perfect reason to have one.
My question is for those of you who may already own one - and may have actually used them when you had a young child - do you find them ergonmically comfortable/functional?
Most new parents I know go for the padded gliders that, while I know how cushy they feel, are about as fugly of a chair as I can imagine putting in my home. Advice?
Hahaha....My husband bought me the Eames rocker when I got my architect's license. It was a combination "You're a real architect/you're ready to have a baby now" gift! He bought it because a friend of his said it was "the best nursing chair ever!" She is about 5'-3", 100 pounds.
For context: I'm 5'-8", 135-ish pounds, and for me it was *just* uncomfortable enough, and I mean that in a good way. It was perfect for nursing - baby was (with a Boppy pillow) at just the right height, and I could use the armrests. It also worked great for reading stories and cuddling and everything else you want to do with baby.
I'm happy, however, that it was not comfortable enough for sleeping. I didn't use a footrest, which might have changed things. When I sit in one of those gliders with my feet up, my comment is always the same"If I'd had this chair, I would have spent every night sleeping in it and never slept in my own bed - it's too comfortable!" I did, on occasion, doze off in the rocker with the baby in my arms, but never for more than an hour or so.
I recommend the Eames rocker - it looks cool, doesn't take up too much space, you'll actually use it in the living room later, it functions great, and...
Warning: following sentence not for the squeamish!
...the sprayed breast milk cleans off it really easily. Big bonus!
eeeeeeeeeeeek!
Having children is not for the squeamish. It gets dirty.
oddly enough breast milk cleanup never entered my thoughts
when i bought mine...
it is pretty comfy to sit in...probably hard to fall asleep in because
of the low back even with your feet up. i think it also depends on
your size...although i'm 6'-1" and it still fits me pretty well.
thanks lb-that is the kind of testimonial I was looking for. I'm a bit taller than you and thought the armrests/backrests would be too low, and my husband is taller yet. I realize I might be accused of vanity by not opting for the cushy/ugly glider. But I see your point of the shell being just comfortable enough for this purpose. I expect that if my husband buys me a glider, I would want to dispose of it once we no longer need nursery furniture, and the RAR will be welcome in my home for the duration.
btw, the breastmilk wipe-up - good call, hadn't thought about that yet!
We need a breast milk clean-up in aisle 12...breast milk clean-up in aisle 12
i just threw up a little in my mouth
clean up in ep's mouth...clean up in ep's mouth!
well this topic digressed pretty fast - what was I thinking...that talking about a chair could possibly compete with the notion of breastmilk. They're just boobs afterall.
You get used to it all...once you have kids, misdirected breastmilk is by far the least offensive liquid (or substance, lets say) that you will be covered in.
Potatoes, my wife and I got the least expensive ugly white framed/blue cushioned glider we could, knowing that it would not stay forever. She used it as the primary nursing spot for our daughter (now 4) and we then went on to do alot of her nighttime reading in that chair. It is now in our 4month old son's room, although it seems that most of the nursing happens elsewhere now. The chair will not find another use here in our home once its function stage ends, so if you can find something like the Eames that will serve you beyond baby/toddler rocking, that is great.
Sorry I do not have first hand experience with that Eames rocking chair.
I would love to find a vintage one, but after some searching it's clear that I can only afford a reproduction-potentially at a discount wholesale rate from a local HM dealer. Even at that price I will have to lobby for choosing the Eames over the cushy glider. If anyone sees a deal (under 350) I would love to know about it.
My wife and I really wanted to use the birth of our some as an excuse to buy and Eames fiberglass rocker but we found that for us it just didn't work well - there is no head rest.
I spend many a night up both rocking my son in the chair and also sitting in his room waiting for him to fall asleep so I could leave and I'm glad we ended up with something I could try and fall asleep in. We bought an inexpensive Ikea thing that we would not feel bad giving away.
WHATEVER YOU DO, DONT BUY A KNOCK-OFF FROM MODERNICA!!!!!
you guys need rep connections...
small potatoes.
white on white makes a similar chair..but if you have something
against the knockoffs you might not want it...although i think they
sell for 150 or so...so it's not much even if you wanted to get rid
of it later...and they're virtually the same as the vintage one i do
have. it may be worth it until you find a real one...i found the one
i think is an original at a street sale..but it cost me 400.
http://www.whiteonwhite.com/
Not trying to side track but I thought Modernica had the original molds and still uses fiberglass??? Isn't there some issue where Modernica gets around paying royalty the Eames foundation - maybe a good reason not to support them too... I don't know for sure.
The new Herman Miller chairs use a thermoplastic or something that is just not a nice in my eyes. The plastic feels cheep too.
thanks lars-I will have to spend some time on that website after work. i am not a purist, nor do I have the budget to aspire to be one, so I will keep my eye open for a used one or perhaps grab one of these affordable reproductions...curious if anyone can explain or compare the Modernica repro's to whiteonwhite or others....
If i had a beautiful vintage chair, I would probably fuss over the baby mess potential anyway.
you could save the four hundred bucks and put it in junior's college fund.
what about formula? Doesnt anyone use that anymore? i know when I was a kid breast feeding was not popular. My sister has 3 kids, 6 mo., 2, and 4 and there entire house is sticky and shit all over. i dont know how people live like that. Brave souls indeed.
I am an 20C furniture nut, and the eames rocker is gorgeous. I don't have little ones yet, but friends with little ones have come over and sat down in our eames rocker and have commented on how comfortable it is for rocking a child to sleep etc.
I purchased an original HM shell on Ebay (fiberglass butterscotch color) and teamed it with an reproduction base (not from Modernica, you can get much cheaper, sturdier ones on Ebay). All up, including shipping, the total cost was just about $300. Craigslist is also a goodie for bargains, particularly if you're in California. Its very hard and expensive to find a vintage rocker base (that is sturdy enough for you to sit on), and the fiberglass shell is the component that had the Herman Miller stamp on it, not the bases.
oOO, then you can team it with a colorful Maharam Alexander Girard cushion!!
ah, the formula vs. breastfeeding debate. Recently the gov't decided to support the formula industry over the health of our nation's infants and required public service announcements to be watered down. Essentially the medical community has decided that breastmilk was ALWAYS the healthiest, most beneficial choice, and the industry feels a drop in profit margin, so dubya to the rescue. I will be returning to work, so a year on the boob is not an option for me completely, but any duration of natural feeding is beneficial if possible.
I was raised on formula, and I turned out fine (easy to say on a discussion bd, I know). But I hate the notion of a corporation telling me their product is the best for my child if the truth is that natural is best, and they just want to make $ off me.
antipodean - thanx I will check out buying shell/base separately.
we were given a dutailier glider as a gift - it was a bent-wood version in clear maple ply that i don't see on their website anymore - too bad - it was the only one we found that we would allow in the house. super comfy....
I knew someone who worked for facilities management at a government facility in Northern California. He pulled two beautiful Eames fiberglass chairs with cats-cradle bases out of the dumpster at work...he then went on to describe to me the couch that was slated for the trash; an Eames sofa compact
My archi friends went to an used furniture auction, and bid on 2 caramel leather HM eames soft pad task chairs. No one else wanted them, so they took them home for...$50 each. New they sell them for a few $ grand down under.
why's it called breast milk, we don't call cow's milk udder milk ... curious. I'm a bachelor, and own one in white. I can say it's also great for certain pre-natal activities too ... kidding. It mostly holds my unfolded laundry these days.
Breast is best. Absolutely.
Breast milk has all kinds of things that come directly from the mother's body and can't be manufactured: antibodies, the things that prevent allergies, enzymes, etc. And, since the taste of breast milk changes depending on the mother's diet, babies are getting exposed to all kinds of flavors and alternative foodstuff that they don't get from eating the same formula day after day (In theory this would lead to less picky eaters, but that's not true with mine!).
That said, formula isn't BAD for a baby. It's good for them, and if a child can't nurse, for whatever reason, formula is absolutely the best choice.
Also, ANY amount of breast milk is good for a child, so even if you can nurse for only a month, a week, or a day, it's beneficial. I was breastfed for six weeks (my mom was a hippie and took a LOT of flak for this from her conservative family) and I breastfed Angus for just over a year, while working - he also got formula and started solids at 5 months.
This is why I love Archinect - we can talk about breast function and chair design in the same thread....
our younger daughter ate her first non-nursing meal today! and had her first water from a sippy cup! yay!
breast is best.
i like that slogan.
i;m exhausted i was up all night inspired to design the breast milk resistant rocker.
i can think of lots of rockers who are resistant to breast milk and kids.
our pediatric nurse once suggested using breast milk for eye infections. our oldest-daughter infant developed some eye infection so a couple of drops of breast milk in the kid's eye and voila - back to normal in about 12-18 hours. seriously, the anti-biotic properties of the stuff are amazing.
congrats steven - though to be honest - i'm really glad we're almost rid of sippy cups in our house now.
el jeffe thanks for bein the buzzkill to my invention.
i don't normally awake and post this early....
el jeffe I just about spit out my coffee (sans milk) at the image of your wife aiming breast milk into your daughter's eye. Magic of dairy...
i wonder what my daughter thought of it...perhaps an infants version of WTF??
I wonder if that would work for blocked tear ducts. Our 4mo boy still has a drain-y eye---I'll suggest my wife take aim next time she nurses.
Modernica actually goes thru the trouble of grinding away the bolt holes / geometry from the bottom of the Authentic Herman-Miller shell and (cold) welding their own to receive their own knock off bases, rendering them somewhat worthless as an antique. Beware, as there are alot of them floating around the vintage Mod market. From a functional standpoint, though, it's a cheap alternative if you can an old shell and take it to them.....they'll even paint it whatever color you want or swap it for one they've got in your color (at least that's what they used to do for us poor gleaners) Back in the day, Zeeland, Michigan has those dang non-biodegradable shells laying around just about everywhere...ahh, the days of pre-post-post-modernism.
Speaking of Lactation, anyone ever use the Cabbage trick if you went Formula? Mother nature is one amazing woman.
A friend of mine used cabbage, it did not work for her. Only time and a lot of wet clothing did.
hey lindsay, why not just by some of that hot bamboo furniture you modeled for?
'i can think of lots of rockers who are resistant to breast milk and kids'
keith richards is pickling himself
Thanks to this thread I am ordering a (Vitra/Herman Miller/Eames) RAR in moss on black base for my new-born nephew. Rather than the crate of port or the silver spoon, or the donation to the fund, or baby clothes, I thought my sister could use it and I could subtly turn my barely conscious nephew into a furniture fetishist. Nice.
does anyone else have an opinion on the newer plastic version? (we were thinking of going the cheap glider route but i would like to avoid that if possible.)
PsyArch, care to send another?
Can I send this link perhaps to people before the baby shower?
You win the sibling award as far as I'm concerned.
Block this user
Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?
Archinect
This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.