Dining Chair Guide

Difficulty: Advanced

Reference Video:

A Note about Chairs

Making a chair requires many advanced techniques and is not recommended for beginners. All chairs must be sturdy, and function first. They must be able to hold a person and therefore require advanced knowledge of joinery techniques and practices to ensure the chair does not break and harm a person.

That being said, chairs are a fun project and are very rewarding to make. They’ll test your skills and push your limits.

In This Guide

You’ll notice this is not a plan, this is a chair making guide for someone who wants to design and make their very own chair. I did not make plans for the Delia Dining Chair, but I do have a download of the template files available. Feel free to use those as a starting point. There is a printable PDF version designed to fit on a single sheet of paper for ease of making templates.

Link to Delia Chair Templates

In the download I did not include templates for the seat or the backrest. I didn’t make them for my build and came up with the curve based on what looked good to me.

General Measurements and Angles

• Seat Height: 18”

This is the height the seat should be from the ground.

• Height to middle of Backrest: 32”

This is the distance from the ground to the middle of the backrest. You want the backrest to hit your back roughly in the middle, which should be around 32” from the floor.

• Seat Size: 18” wide by 16 inches deep

This one is subjective. Some chairs are bigger, some are smaller. Generally, you’ll find seats are 18”x16” but feel free to change these based on the size of the people who will sit in the chairs.

• Seat Angle: 2 Degrees

This is the angle the seat tilts back, making the front slightly higher than the back. 2 degrees is enough to make the chair feel flat, but a flat chair tends to want to push your butt forward, making you feel like you’re always falling out of the chair.

• Seat Taper: 2 Degrees

The chair seat should taper, being wider in the front and skinnier in the back. My first few models did not have this taper and the chair looked off. At first it was because the proportions weren’t right, but after I dialed them in I realized the problem was no longer proportions, it was the squareness. Most chairs have a smaller back leg footprint than front and when that is missing the chair looks off to the eye.

• Backrest Angle: 13 Degrees

This is 13 degrees leaning back. In reality that means it is 13 degrees off of 90 from the floor, or 77 degrees. I found this angle to be perfect. It was comfortable to lean back into and nicely held your back.

Good luck and I hope that helps my fellow chair makers.