Lumbar Support

We discovered the curve for the back splats (the four vertical back supports) by trial and error--many trials, much error. For people short and tall, this curve supports the natural curvature of the spine. How can that be? An orthopedic surgeon visiting the shop said, "We humans are not nearly so different from the bottom of the coccyx to the top of the lumbar as our overall height would suggest. We're all about the same." That made sense of it.

We tried flexible splats, but found that the best support and comfort came from the correct curve, not a changing one.

Your two large back muscles run up the two center splats to be gently massaged by rocking. Your vertibrae fit between.

Hips

The deepest part of the scoop in the chair seat locates the lowest point of the hipbones, discouraging slumping and holding you back against the lumbar support.

In most chairs, you feel "hot spots" from sitting on flat or poorly contoured seats, because your bones are pinching your cheeks. If the seat is accurately shaped so that it is deepest where your hipbones are nearest your skin, then your weight is distributed over your flesh...and you provide your own padding.

Is your derriere flat and square?

Shoulders

The curve of the crest rail forms the chair back into an embracing contour flowing into support for the arms and hands.

The Shape of the Arms

The tops of the arms are shaped to a soft relief so you feel no edge. They cushion the forearm and end in a profile to fit your palms and fingers.

The Pitch of the Arms

The chair arms are higher at the front than in the back, not parallel to the seat or lower in front. This is profound in its benefits. Hand-above-elbow settles you back into the chair, nestles child to breast or lap, locates a book, eases exit, and places the best point of leverage for rocking at your fingertips.

Angle of Repose

The rocker comes to rest at an angle of repose. Your muscles are relaxed and at ease, providing peace, tranquility, and a sense of well-being. Your head rests on your shoulders without engaging the muscles of your neck.

Bad Backs

A doctor's suggestion that motion and time in a rocker would relieve his back pain led President Kennedy to place a rocking chair in the White House, making the Kennedy Rocker a household name. If the president did obtain the suggested benefits, he must have strategically placed cushions and pads in that chair for it was flat in all the places that humans are not: back, seat, arms...

Our rocking chair has helped many people relax back tension and relieve back pain. This link will bring up patron's comments sorted for Weeks Rocking Chair Comfort. Many mention their back. When someone reports "My back instantly felt comfort that I have not felt in years," we feel like we hit another one over the wall.

For some, particularly for those with compromised anatomy, our chairs (designed to an ideal--to be a human form in negative) cannot help. We are happy to speak with you about your particular concerns. See the Guarantee of Satisfaction.

Performance

I looked at a farm for sale one time. The owner drove me into a field where the blood weed grew 10 feet high. He said, "This land will grow corn and it will grow watermelons and everything in between." I should have bought it.

In our rocking chairs you can:

• read
• rock babies
• have a conversation
• move with vigor
• put your feet up and lounge
• watch the tube
• meditate
• sleep.

Most rocking chairs are only good for one of the above, if that. The others will hurt your back, neck, forearm, or some other place before long.

The Limits

Some very few people won't find what they need in our chairs. A chair is returned every other year or so, from people who:

• have severe scoliosis or other structural misalignment. The chair is contoured for the range of normal skeletons in a broad bell curve.
  
• are very heavy. They need more width.
• just don't find it fits, and can't say why.

There are some who love their chairs and sit comfortably...with compromise, as those:

• over 6'-4" or so, or with long legs, who would prefer the seat to be higher.
• under 5'-0" or with short legs, who would prefer the seat was lower.
• some lean people who feel their hipbones after a time. We make a cushion that is thin enough to maintain the geometry of the chair, but does provide some padding.
  

The Commentary