Upholstered Armless Chair/ Zanav Upholstery

The Upholstered Armless Chair/Zanav Collection, is available in a choice of seven Andaman and three Bompuka fabric colours.

Andaman is a cotton/linen blend fabric woven in a simple Panama weave. The entire process of yarn winding, warping, denting, drawing and dyeing is by hand. The fabric is dyed using the traditional and cumbersome vat dyeing process in which the yarn is turned manually in and out of a vat containing solubilised dyes, resulting in continuous reduction and oxidation deep into the fibre until the desired colour is achieved. The yarn picks up dye differentially, and the result is a subtle inconsistency of colour which is the hallmark of all vat dyed fabrics. The final fabric is woven on traditional power looms, the likes of which are seldom used today.

Bompuka is a 100% cotton upholstery fabric designed by Belgian textile designer Fabienne Collet for Zanav. As with all Zanav fabrics, Bompuka is produced by processes that are mostly manual, with nearly extinct powerlooms used for the final fabric weave. These old looms have limited pattern options, and out of this constraint Fabienne created a unique fabric by experimenting with the interplay of weave, colour, light, etc. For example, twisting two differently coloured vat dyed yarns brings light play to the matte cotton fibre and blurs the edges of the very small geometric repeat. Bompuka requires a high level of skill and craftsmanship; it would not be possible to design and produce it consistently if hand and culture was missing from the process.

The Upholstered Armless Chair/Zanav Collection can be ordered in a choice of two wood finishes - Stripped Black (Z3) and Walnut (Z4). Both these finishes have been developed specially for the Zanav Collection. The Stripped Black (Z3) finish is achieved by spraying the wood with a water based black paint and then stripping off the black paint using a steel brush and sandpaper until the black streaks are left behind only in the grain patterns of the wood. The Walnut (Z4) finish is achieved by hand staining the wood with a water based walnut stain and applying a coat of wood sealer