GB2059758A - Furniture - Google Patents

Abstract

An item of furniture comprising an envelope or bag made from flexible substantially inextensable material and containing a stuffing material in the form of discrete particles, preferably foamed polystyrene beans, the bag having a chair shape, when loaded with beans, including a back panel 7 and a seat panel (3), with a sealable opening 14 for filling the envelope with beans and an internal tie 10 joining a bottom panel 2 to a part of the envelope adjacent the junction 12 of back panel 7 and the seat panel (3) to maintain the envelope in the chair shape when in use. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Improvements in furniture This invention relates to improvements in bean furniture commonly referred to as bean bag furniture.

Bean bags are envelopes of flexible fabric, vinyl or like material which have a given shape and are partially filled with foamed polystyrene pellets called beans. A bean bag can be used as a chair or a stool or even a bed depending upon the form and size of the bag. This invention is particularly concerned with bean bags as used for chairs.

The shape that a bean bag adopts, when in use, is a factor of the initial shape of the bag, the amount of beans in the bag, the manner of distribution of the beans in the bag before use, and pressure zones during use which can cause a redistribution of beans.

More often than not, the bag when in use for a period of time changes shaped due to movements of the user or continuous local areas of pressure. Such bags can become uncomfortable and subsequently have to be "re-moulded" to a contour suitable to the user.

A common and major discomfort for a user arises because of lack of support for the back of the user.

Although a back support may originally be "moulded" into the bag as user back pressure is increased the beans flow from the zone of increasing pressure into a zone of decreasing pressure. The result is a substantial decrease in the support for the user's back and a rapid departure of the bean bag from the original contour established by the user.

Bean bag furniture is broadly termed "free form furniture" because it has no initial predetermined constant configuration. It is a fluid form of furniture due to the tendency of the beans to move around in the bag as outside influences have effect, bean bag furniture as presently known lacks a constant basic form of configuration.

The advantages of bean bag furniture are many and are, for example, ease of manufacture, fluid nature enabling the bag to take up a shape required by the user to provide a desired contour and support for desired body regions and finally the ability to add or remove beans as required by the user to provide a firm (supportive) or soft (enveloping) body support.

There are also disadvantages, the primary disadvantage being lack of an initial predetermined configuration and this necessitates periodic remoulding of the bag to the desired configuration.

The present invention overcomes the above major problem by providing a bean bag which has a basic predetermined chair shape and configuration due to the cut of the bag and internal ties the bag however remains fluid in the sense that the user can move beans around within that predetermined shape to give body supporting contours without the basic shape of the chair being substantially altered. Additionally, the bag in one form incorporates tension panels to connect the back part of the chair to other parts of the chair so that forces applied to the back part will be transmitted to other chair panels subjected to other forces. The back part is thus braced against the forces acting and the chair tends to hold its basic shape in use.The bean bag chair of this invention does not need to be remoulded periodically but requires only periodic "fluffing" to fluidise the beans in the several zones of the chair as desired by the user.

Presently preferred forms of the invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: Fig. 1 is a front view of one form of the bean bag chair according to this invention.

Fig. 2 is a back view of the chair of Fig. 1.

Fig. 3 is a side view of the chair of Fig. 1.

Fig. 4 is a bottom view of the chair of Fig. 1.

Fig. 5 is a sectional elevation of the chair of Fig. 1 showing internal tie means.

Fig. 6 is a perspective view of a harness used in the interior of a second embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 7 is a front view of the second embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 8 is a side view of the second embodiment of the invention, and Fig. 9 is a view from below of the second embodiment of the invention.

As illustrated the chair 1 has a body part made up of a bottom panel 2 and a seat panel 3 thereabove and a continuous band 4 which can be made up of one or several joined parts and which increases in width from a narrow region 5to a wider region 6 which lie opposite each other. The seat panel 3 adjacent the wider region 6 extends upward as a back panel 7 to the height of the band wider region 6 and is joined thereto by stitching. The seat panel 3 at opposite sides adjacent the back panel 7 are upswept to form side (tension) panels 8 which extend above the adjacent upper edges of the band 4 and are joined thereto as by stitching. The seat panel 3 adjacent the narrow band region 5 is long enough to extend beyond the band 4 and is peripherally joined to the band 4 as by stitching.

The cut of the material, from which the various panels are made, is such that the zones of junction of the seat panel 3 and side panels 8 with the adjacent band 4 forms a large overfolding pocket 9 which tapers in volume from a maximum at the front of the chair 9a around both sides of the chair to substantially disappear at 9b where the back panel 7 joins the band wider region 6.

At the junction of the seat panel 3 and the back panel 7 a substantially inextensible internal tie 10 is provided which tie 10 is attached to inner surface of the chair bottom 2 at 11 to retain a substantially constant depressed position for the back to seat panel junction, indicated 12.

The tie 10 is generally vertical below the back to seat junction 12. The tie 10 at its upper end and lower end is connected, preferably by stitching, to thejunc- tion point 12 and the bottom panel at 11. The tie 10 is of substantially inextensible fabric or other flexible sheet material and has an hour glass shape being wider at its upper and lower ends than at its waisted central part 13. The shape of the tie has a function which is not essential to the overall operation ofthe chair but is a desirable feature. This will be described later.

A bean filling aperture is provided in normal man ner in the chair bottom panel 2 as a slit with a closure zipper 4. It is to be noted that the zipper 14 lies between the stitching line 11 and the chair back panel 6. This position is one of convenience to assist with filling the bag with beans. It is not essential to have this relationship. It is preferred that a bean filling fabric tube 15 is connected at one end to the interior of the bag around the aperture of zipper 14.

The tube 15 is, under normal circumstances, rolled over and over on itself along its length to form a sealed end. The rolled up tube 15 is stored in the bag where it is held rolled up due to compression between the beans in the bag and the zipper 14 which is zipped up after bean filling is completed. This provides a safety valve bean filling means which, in the event that the zipper 14 being slightly open, would prevent beans for escaping as would otherwise be the case. It is also preferred that the back panel is elastically pleated as at 16to give a pleasing aesthetic appearance and to also provide a degree of flexiability in back 7.

The amount of beans in the bag is such that the volume bounded by the bottom, the seat, the band and the roll is filled with a quantity giving desired "firmness" of feel when used. The amount of beans in the roll at the front of the seat, the largest roll portion and which is adapted to provide a firm roll support behind the knees of a user, is varied to suit individual requirement by puffing up the beans in the bag to cause them to enter the roll or causing them to leave the roll and migrate back to the bag proper.

The shape of the roll behind the knees once established will remain substantially constant due to the weight of the user's legs bringing the portion of the seat panel 3 where it turns over the band 5 into close contact (indicated 17) thereby providing a throttling effect to any tendency of the beans in the roll to migrate back into the bag proper when the chair is in use.

When ready for use the chair has the predetermined basic shape shown in Figs. 1 to 4. When the usersitsinthechairtherewill be an initial small bean redistribution due to the weight of the user.

The beans flow from zones of high pressure to zones of lower initial pressure. Invariably the major pressure occurs where body weight is exerted through the buttocks to the seat panel 3 and to the beans therebelow. There is a tendency for the beans to migrate from below the seat panel 3 to the back of the chair. This tendency is discouraged by the tie 10 which substantially separates the zone of beans below the seat panel 3 from the zone of beans in the chair back. Migration rate is limited by causing migrating beans to pass through throttling zones determined by the "waisting" of the tie. Migration rates can be controlled by varying the "wasting" of tie 10. The upper legs and knees then bear down on the front roll holding beans therein substantially captive.

When the user leans back a balance of forces is developed. The back panel 7 will tend to move backwardly with an accompanying tendencyforthe seat/back junction 12 to rise. The former tendency is resisted by the side panels 8 connecting the back panel 7 to the seat/front roll portions. The side panels 8 take up a tension condition induced by the force tending to move the back backwardly and the reaction forces upwardly at the roll 9a. The reaction force is resisted by the weight of the user's legs acting downwardly on the roll 9a. The second tendency is resisted by the internal tie 10 in the chairwhich anchors the seatback junction 12 to chair bottom 2.

It is understood multiple internal ties 10 from the seat panel 3 to other panels of the chair may be used to provide a basic chair form. Such a chair whilst having a substantially constant shape in use still provides the well known and desirable bean bag fluidity which is however now of a controlled type and within that control the beans can be moved to provide comfortable seating simply by the user either positioning beans by hand prior to use of the chair or by "squirming" in the chairtill a desired degree of comfort is achieved with pressure regions to support the body of the user as required.

In the embodiment of Figs. 1 to 5 the chair maintains a considerable degree of fluidity of form due to the possibility of bean flow between the back zone, the seat zones and the arm zones. A chair having a more constant shape under conditions of use is now disclosed with reference to the Figs. 6 to 9. This is achieved by making the chair around an internal harness identified 20 in Fig. 6. The harness comprises two shaped portions 21-22 interconnected by a tie member 23, which in the finished chair func- tions as does the tie member 10 ofthe first embodiment. The harness side portions have elongated parts 24 rearward of tie 23 to form the sides of a back compartment, and the remainder 25 of the portions 21-22, forward of the tie 23, form the ends for a seat compartment. The portions 21-22 respectively form the inner walls of two arm compartments.

Referring to Fig. 7, which is a perspective front view of a chair according to the second embodiment of the invention, it will be seen that there are two adjoining panels 26-27 on which the back and buttocks of a user rest. The panels 26-27 are joined by stitching to the harness side portions 21-22 at the locations 28-29 and the join line 30 of the panels 26-27 is stitched tithe upper edge 31 of the tie 23. A front panel 32 is stitched as at 33 to the upright edges 34 of the side portions 21-22. A rear panel is sewn to the long edges 35 of the portions 21-22. The lower edge 36 of the tie 23 to either side of a notch 37 is sewn where indicated 36a and 36b to a base panel 38 at opposite sides of a slide fastener 39 mounted in the base panel 38. There is thus formed a back compartment and a seat compartment isolated one from the other except for the cross-over communication that is possible where the notch 37 is provided. Thus the slide fastener 39 serves to close two openings, one into the back compartment and one into the seat compartment. The notch 37 is too small to permit transfer of beans from one compartment to the other when the slide fastener is closed and particularly so as the base panel 38 where the vee notch is located is under pressure when the chair is in use.

Side, or arm, compartments are formed by shaped part-envelopes 40 marginally joined by stitching along lines 28,29,33 and 35 to the back and seat compartments, and by stitching at 34 to the base panel 38 so as to incorporate slide fasteners 41 for filling the arm compartments. The inner panels 42 of the arm compartments act as tension panels as previously explained.

Beans to the required amount are loaded into the back and seat compartments through the slide fastener 39, likewise beans to the required amount are loaded into the arm compartments through the slide fasteners 41.

The foregoing concepts are equally suited to single or multiple seat furniture manufactured of flexible substantially inextensible fabric, vinyl, plastic or combinations of the foregoing with flexible stiffening support panels. An example would be a laminate of vinyl and woven fabric to resist excessive stretch of the vinyl.

In the case of multiple seat chairs made according to the second embodiment there is preferably provided a transverse tie 43 between the parts 35 of the harness portions 21-22 as shown in dotted lines in Fig. 6. It is understood that in multi-seat chairs the harness portion, 21 or 22, is common to adjacent back/seat compartment groups and the arm compartments only occur at the ends of the chair.

The second embodiment has been described without the "knee roll" described in detail in the first embodiment.

Whilst the filling or stuffing material referred to herein has been characterised as foamed polystyrene beans, other "beanlike" discrete materials can be used in place of polystyrene beans.

Claims (7)

1. A bean bag chair comprising an envelope of flexible substantially inextensible material so shaped that when filled or substantially filled with a stuffing material in the form of foamed polystyrene beans it will provide an item of furniture having a back zone and a base zone respectively incorporating a back panel and an adjoined seat panel to support the back of a user and the buttocks of a user respectively, said envelope also including a bottom panel below the seat panel and a rear panel behind the back panel and two side panels; a sealable filling opening whereby beans can be loaded into the envelope and a flexible substantially inextensible tie means extending internally in the envelope from a position at or adjacent the junction of the back panel and the seat panel to the bottom panel.

2. A bean bag chair as claimed in claim 1, wherein the side panels act as tension panels to distribute some of the load applied to the back panel by the back of a userto the seat panel.

3. A bean bag chair as claimed in claim 1 wherein the tie means is a panel of hour glass shape being wider at the ends than at a waisted intermediate portion.

4. A bean bag chair as claimed in claim 1 including a knee support roll in communication with and forming part of the bean filled base zone of the chair and located opposite the back panel of the chair.

5. A bean bag chair as claimed in claim 1 wherein the side panels are respectively parts of two arm zones each having a sealable filling opening to permit beans to be loaded into the arm zones.

6. A bean bag chair as claimed in claim 5 wherein the sealable filling opening in the bottom panel is a slit extending laterally of the bottom panel with a slide fastener to close the slit, the tie means is a panel attached to the side panels and at or adjacent the junction of the back panel to the seat panel and across the bottom panel partly along one of the sides of said slit and partly along the other side of said slit thereby isolating the back zone from the seat zone except for communication in the vicinity of said slit.

7. A bean bag chair substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.