Flemingsbergs church now has chairs ready for another 44 years
Flemingsberg Church was inaugurated in 1976, 44 years ago. The church was designed by architect Gunnar Cedervall. The church room itself is square and the entrance is in one corner and the altar in the opposite corner. The parish is proud of its church which is really located in the middle of the village, at the center of Flemingsberg.
The roof of the church room has a slope and is at its highest at the entrance with a large light entry and at its lowest at the altar. It is done to create focus on the altar and the pine-sculpted altarpiece by Per Nilsson Öst. Much of the church is original, so are the chairs. It has 140 chairs and armchairs of model S-312. The chair was designed in the early 60's by furniture designer Axel Larsson. We still manufacture the model.
The chairs are made of birch, which is unusual as beech dominated as a wood at that time. They have withstood the test of time well, but the varnish had turned yellow and the synthetic web strap had lost its elasticity and looked grayish.
The parish wanted to know if the chairs could be renovated and we agreed to redo the web strap and sand and re-varnish the chairs. It was thought that this would happen in stages so that one would not be left without seats. Then came the pandemic. The need for seating decreased with the restrictions and we received more chairs and were able to solve it faster. We are happy that the congregation is happy with the result and that they now have nice chairs that will stand for many more years.
We have always helped with renovation, usually of our own models, but also other makers models.
Our factory is located in Mönsterås on the east coast 400 km south of Stockholm and we have a network of skilled craftsmen and subcontractors in Sweden. We have stuck to making our models ourselves for the sake of know-how and flexibility.
The focus is on manufacturing sustainable furniture exclusively for public environments. Sustainability in particular has become increasingly important. It takes 60 years for a birch to grow so large that it can be used for furniture. We are convinced that the chairs in Flemingsbergs church will cope with that time span by a margin, that is sustainability.
Model 312 was designed by Axel Larsson, but it was architect Rolf Bergh who came up with the idea to put web strap on the seat when he designed temporary churches and the model used in dining halls and schools began to be used in churches. Rolf Bergh spent a large part of his career designing and renovating churches.
The web strap we use is in the same material as car seat belts, but with a different weave. It has a tensile strength of 400 kg and can be wiped off. Unlike natural saddle girth, it lasts a long time. The chair will be comfortable to sit on with a flexibility in the seat and low weight, to the delight of the staff moving the chairs aliund for different activities.
The web strap is specially developed for the chair in a width of 60mm to fit the chair's dimensions. It takes 7 meters to upholster one chair. As it is a special weave, we have to order 10,000 meters of web strap every time we run out, which is enough for 1,400 seats. The strap is available in natural color and black. We also sell web strap for upholsterers who renovate 312 chairs as the weaving and width can not be found anywhere else.