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Church of England's Design Competition Eschews the Pews

By Rain Noe - June 20, 2012

in Furniture Design

The last time I said the word "pew" I was making a laser sound effect, but for regular churchgoers, the word carries more import. During service you'll spend minutes or hours parked in a pew, a piece of furniture not typically known for its comfort, aesthetic value, or flexibility of arrangement; that's why the recent Design a Church Chair! competition, sponsored by the Church of England, eschewed pews altogether in favor of individual chairs.

Here are our faves from the selected winners:

Sir Terence Conran's design features a neat slide-out drawer, accessible from the rear, so the worshipper behind you can break out the hymn book. (This design presumably requires that those who would sit in the front row have excellent memories.)

The design from Soren Rose Studio features a connector that not only binds chairs together in solidarity, but provides a handy shelf for the hymn books.

The contribution from Julian Evans of UK design firm BroomeJenkins goes with the more familiar book slot design, though wrapped in a clean, modernist package. There's also the nice detail of the red inlay on the cross cutout.

Each of the winning designs is projected to retail for under £200. Sounds kind of expensive to me, but I suppose that's why they pass the basket around.

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Sean

12 years ago

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I'm fairly dissapointed; to me this seems like style over substance.

From what I've seen, some of the brief specs -- such as "able to stack or fold neatly and compactly" and "with the option of linking and having a book-holder, arms, and a hook or ledge for a kneeler" -- seem to have been neglected to produce a beautiful chair with a christian motif.

I haven't been to a CofE service in a while (I was a churchgoing Catholic until my mid-teens), but don't you kneel when you pray? Granted I haven't seen all the winners, so I'd be grateful if you were to prove me wrong, but not one of the entries I've seen has included the option of a knee-rest/pad thing.

It seems a shame that such a high profile competition will most likely produce a beautiful and well-crafted chair that is too expensive and too impractical for the average CofE to seriously consider buying into, especially in a time of waning weekly attendance and ever-shrinking budget.

*BTW This was all based on my assumption that in a CofE; a) these chairs are to replace pews as the main seating in a mass/service and that b) CofE-goers kneel when they pray during a mass/service. If I'm wrong, I'm a willin to be edjakated)
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