Ercol butterfly chairs

Hello everybody

I am new to this forum and I am glad to join you.
I want to buy some mid century Ercol butterfly chairs and I know that Ercol have restarted to make them in the 2000's.
So I need your expertise to know if the ones I found are genuine mid century.
I don't want to pay a huge amount for recent chairs!

Thank you in advance!

Aude

 

Welcome Aude.
The furniture people will be along later, maybe @Jeff Drum can tell you more about how to tell the difference.

 

Newer. The older ones don't have Phillips head screws. Those are pretty recent screws. I'd still buy them mind you, I like Ercol.

 

I'd ask Ercol Poirot.

 

i don't know these chairs ..but...should the backrest be two glued together sheets of wood....or one solid piece ?

 

They're normally a kind of bonded then steam shaped wood.

 

I was born near the Ercol factory in High Wycombe in the UK!. The town was famous for its chair making for a while. Sadly I didn't pay enough attention to their designs to be able to help

 

Ercol are still very much in business: they've a rather smarter factory now, I went up there a few years back to get my bits reupholstered. It's good stuff.

 

I'm in the US, and unlike ownedbybear I have no experience with Ercol furniture, so unlike owned my opinion has limited value. There are some minor differences between the vintage and reproduction chairs that you can find by googling, so I suggest you put in some research.

 

Your opinion always has value.

I sit on Ercol every day!

 

Thank you everybody!

 

Phillips screws were introduced in the 1930s. Judging by the wear, I'd say your chairs are mid century - they're lovely. I love Ercol furniture, but the new stuff is way outside my budget, and the original pieces still fetch good money at auction. Enjoy your chairs!

 

Phillips screws didn't come into furniture use here until well after WW2. Those are very recent ones: Ercol stuck with traditional screws for a very long time and still mostly use pegs. As to the wear, my 1980s Ercol has far more true patina than those.