“A chair can be a living link to the past,” writes influential architect and author Witold Rybczynski on the first page of his book, Now I Sit Me Down (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, $25). That much becomes abundantly clear throughout the engaging account, which traces the unexpected design history of seating. The idea for the book came to Rybczynski, an emeritus professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, while researching a 2014 article for Architect magazine on Tadao Ando’s dazzling but flawed Dream chair. In this 227-page account, which is dotted with illustrations drawn by the author himself, anecdotes range in subject from ancient Greek designs to postmodern master Michael Graves’s work for JCPenney. One of the most intriguing sections appears near the end, focusing on chairs with “special” uses—including wheelchairs, strollers, swings, and folding chairs—and detailing how many of them have deep historical roots. Discover 13 chairs that had an impact on the world of design and read Rybczynski’s thoughts on seven of the most influential chairs in the book.
