- By BackWorld
- November 5, 2024
- News
I am often asked what my favourite chair is. Although I completely understand why anyone would ask me, I don’t particularly like the question. Many people spend 8 hours a day in their office chair, and my favourite might not be yours. I would ask a friend who’s just forked out on a new mattress if they like it, but I wouldn’t spend that sort of money without trying one for myself first, and I’m reluctant to lead anyone into making such an investment without first seeing if it’s right for them.
For this reason we keep a showroom, and are happy for people to trial a chair at home before making a decision.
The type of work a person does is as important as the type of person they are. But for the purposes of these words, I’m assuming that the person asking has a relatively sedentary desk/computer based office job.
It’s hard to describe using words and pictures what makes one chair better, or worse than another.
Try doing it with a pair of shoes. ‘My leather Loake Chelsea boots are a premium waxy Leather Chelsea Boot, featuring Goodyear welted rubber soles for greater longevity and grip. Chatsworth uses the ‘Jockey’ last shape, and is available in a ‘G’ fitting. These men’s shoes are designed and engineered in Kettering and made in our high-grade factory in England.’
Want one? Meh.
But if you’ve got this far, you must want to know, so here goes: My favourite chair is the Rh Logic.
This doesn’t mean that the Hag Capisco, Salli saddle, or Ergochair’s Adapt for example aren’t brilliant. And any of those, and more, might be better for you. There will be times when one of these might be better for me, but if I can only have one chair for all my work, for all my days, it would be the Rh Logic.
The Logic simply makes my working day better. It’s as if its designers gave it the knowledge to understand what my body needs when I sit. Logic helps me to stay focussed and healthy. I can adjust it to suit me, and easily change the adjustment if I feel the need. It’s 2pp (2 point pivot) system follows my body’s own natural movements so my body doesn’t tire and ache as the hours tick by. And it does all this in silence. And because it is well built with high quality materials and parts, it will do this for many, many years.
It was designed in Sweden by experts in biomechanics, and the while as I said, it’s hard to express in words, when you sit in a chair this good, and then one that was designed quickly on a cad system, to be built quickly by the thousands and shipped to the lowest bidder, the difference is night and day.
The Rh Logic was first introduced in 1987, and 27 years on and today’s Logic 300/400 range of chairs still use many of the same components. So good was the original that it has only received two updates, the last of which in 2005.
We’re all different shapes and sizes and like many great chairs, the Logic covers most bases. It is available with two different sizes of back rest, and more importantly, two different sizes of seat, each of which feature large amounts of adjustment.
Time is catching up with the old Logic. The modern world, the Scandinavians of course in particular, is more focussed than ever on its environmental responsibilities. So in 2019 Rh launched a new Logic, the 200 series. So good was the original, there really isn’t much to tell between the two in the way that they work, and the new model adopts the same principles. But the newer model has a much lower carbon footprint and a much higher amount of recycled materials in it. It does look different: fresh and modern, and Rh worked to make it more intuitive and easier to set up and adjust.
And it just feels like it will last forever. It won’t of course, nothing does, but it’s guaranteed for 10 years and we’ve seen examples twice as old as that.
And the quality is often nowhere near good enough. A good office chair will typically have a maximum user weight of 150kg and at least a 5 year warranty. We’re not seeing much of that in a gaming chair. If my backside is going to spend hours in one place I want a natural breathable textile, like leather or wool. Too often gaming chairs are finished in garishly coloured polyesters which fall apart about the same time as the limited warranty expires.
So to our favourite chairs for gaming. We don’t like to call them gaming chairs as we don’t want you to assume they’re the same poorly built limited feature chairs that usually wear that tag. But the Ergohuman Elite, complete with neck rest and footrest we think makes as good a gaming chair as you can buy. With its cool mesh, it’s got ‘the look’, its mechanism reclines further than most office chairs and it has an adjustable headrest and foldable foot rest. And it has large soft topped 5D armrests.
And we also love the Rh Mereo 220 chair. Rh make some of the best ergonomic chairs in the world and the Mereo has been designed to allow you to move about more in the chair, hence it’s a little smaller in the back than most so your shoulders and upper back feel more free. It can also be had in a massive choice of fabrics and colours, which can be combined to allow the user to create a truly individual chair.