19th c. Corner Napoleon III Chair

Picture a small Napoleon III parlour in the Loire Valley a hundred and fifty years ago - a card table set up in the corner, four friends pulled in close, and a chair exactly like this one slipped into the corner of the room so a fifth person could play. Found in the Loire valley, this 19th-century French corner chair is built in the bobbin tradition, the back curving around in a half-moon of stacked rounds, the legs and X-stretcher all turned to match, the seat caned in fine reed. Corner chairs were never made in numbers and finding one with the cane still original and the bobbins still tight is the harder part. Sylvie sets it in a quiet corner of a bedroom with a small lamp beside it, the kind of chair you cross the room to sit in.