I spent yesterday spring cleaning the house. I only got through the hall, our bedroom and Scarlett and Jemima’s room (which is a bit depressing because I hate cleaning). Still, they really are done from top to bottom.

So as I was cleaning I was thinking about a post for today, and as I cleaned this chair I thought I could write about it. It sits in our bedroom and is the collector of cycling clothes and Clive’s ugg boots. We inherited it from Clive’s uncle Phil, his Dad’s brother. Phil inherited the chair from his father’s business, and stripped it and restored it.

And Phil had a story about why he had to strip the chair. It started off something like ‘Arthur was always …’.

During the depression, Phil’s cousin Arthur Boyd left school and went to work for his uncle (who was Clive’s grandpa and Phil’s dad).  And whilst working there, so the story went, one day he just decided to paint the office chair orange, the same colour as the farm machinery they sold, for no reason, and without discussing it with anyone, just because the paint was there …

This chair. That’s the story.  And Phil wanted to make it look nice, so he stripped it back.

I wonder if it would be worth more today if Phil had left the Arthur Boyd orange on?

Anyway, it’s a nice chair and I like knowing that it has an orange/arty history.  And Phil did a super job restoring the timber. We use it every day.