A Regency chair, corrected for this climate

The Regency form arrived in India through colonial cabinetmakers and was immediately improved upon. The upholstered seat and back gave way to woven cane, because cane breathes and upholstery does not. What survived was the proportion — the scrolled back, the tapered leg, the restraint.

This chair keeps both the proportion and the correction, in black and white against natural cane.

Hand-woven cane

Seat and back are caned by hand in our own workshop by artisans who do nothing else. The tension is worked by eye rather than machine-pressed, which is why the weave sits slightly differently on every chair. In a humid climate cane also outlasts upholstery by decades — it breathes rather than holding damp, and deepens in colour rather than wearing thin.

Where it works

Light enough to move, formal enough to hold a room. It works as a dining chair, at a desk, in a pair flanking a console, or as the occasional chair in a bedroom that never quite has room for an armchair.

Specification

• Dimensions: 65cm W x 55cm D x 100cm H
• Material: solid teak with hand-woven cane
• Finish: black and white

Making and delivery

• Handcrafted to order in Temple Town's own workshop in Thrissur, Kerala
• Dispatch in 4 to 6 weeks depending on availability
• Arrives assembled
• Slight variation in colour, grain and cane tone is inherent to handmade work
• 1-year warranty against manufacturing defects, termite and borer. Normal wear, accidental damage, improper use or cleaning, and natural wood movement are excluded
• As each piece is made to order, cancellations and refunds cannot be accepted once the order is placed

Temple Town builds in the Heirloom Modernism idiom: Indian craft held to the standard of the world's finest furniture, made to be inherited rather than replaced.