Review of The Humanscale Freedom Chair

The Humanscale Freedom Chair is a chair that can rightly be described as revolutionary in design, function and concept.

Designed by master designer Niels Diffrient and released in 1999 the Freedom chair has in its short lifetime won 10 international design awards and it's not difficult to see why it deserves the accolade of ultimate ergonomic office chair.

So what is it that makes the Humanscale Ergonomic Freedom Chair so radically different and unique when compared to other Ergonomic Office Chairs?

Probably the most striking feature is the absence of the endless array of lever, knobs and buttons normally associated with an ergonomic office chair.

You need only adjust four functions on a Freedom Chair - seat height, seat depth, back height and arm height and headrest height if you choose that option. Although this might sound like a lot of adjustments they are actually very simple to carry out and once completed you chair really is set up from there on in. Niels Diffrient was determined to keep things as simple as possible with the Freedom Chair and its ease of use.

The Humanscale Freedom Chair is ergonomically brilliant in concept and, it has been designed to recognize that users don't stay still in their office chair, our bodies simply weren't made to be static they have to move to maintain joint mobility and muscle tone.

The Freedom Chair moves with you and supports your body's natural movements and has been designed to encourage frequent changes of posture and the ability to safely support you through the many changes of position you make during the day in your office chair.

At the heart of the ergonomic design of the Freedom Chair is its intelligent mechanism. Its unique counter balancing system automatically adjusts to your body weight, it senses your weight and moves smoothly and effortlessly to the position your body has chosen to adopt. And the chair does this with no need to press, pull or turn any knobs or levers, it intuitively supports your body movements.

It doesn't matter whether you are tall or short, big or small the Freedom Chair is designed to take all these variables into account and claims to be able to suit 90% of the population.

Unlike a lot of modern ergonomic office chairs the Humanscale Freedom Chair is great for reclining and in fact encourages it, allowing a reclining angle of up to 27 degrees. As you recline the chair's position sensitive headrest (where fitted), supports your head's movements too with its contoured cradle.

Once you sit upright again the headrest moves out of the way, this makes sense as it isn't really practical to design a headrest that maintains good contact in an upright position.

Let's take a look at the functions that you need to set up on a Freedom Chair and how easy they are to do. There are four separate adjustments on the standard model, plus one more if you have a headrest on your chair.

Seat Height

This is the usual arrangement for office chair height adjustment and is controlled by a sleek semi-concealed lever under the right of the Freedom's seat pan. Lift the lever when seated and the seat goes down, take your weight off the chair and lift the lever and the seat raises.

Seat Depth

The seat depth on the Freedom Chair is adjusted by a lever on the left underside of the seat pad, raise it and slide the seat in or out to your desired seating position, then release the lever.

Back Height

Back height adjustment is carried out by gripping the backrest from behind on its lower corners and depressing a handle on the right. Simply slide the seat back up or down to find your ideal seating position.

Arm Height

Arm height adjustment on a Humanscale Freedom Chair is quite unusual and novel. To raise the arms just gently pull them up to the required position, once you release them they will automatically lock when released. To lower the arms, simply rotate them towards you and lower them to the height you want, once again the arms will automatically lock in position once you release them. There is an advanced arm option which allows width adjustment as well.

Headrest Height

The Freedom's dynamic, position-sensitive headrest is adjusted by gripping it from behind with both hands and sliding it to the desired position.

And those are the only adjustments you need ever make to the Humanscale Freedom Chair. It really is a one off task to set the chair up to your exact needs, thereafter no further manual changes have to be made. The other good point is that all the adjustments can be easily carried out whilst seated in the Freedom Chair.

Finishes

The chair comes in three frame finishes Graphite, Titanium and Polished Aluminium (extra cost), and a wide range of fabrics as well as leather (extra cost).

The fabric ranges are Vellum and Wave and are both four way stretch materials that are extremely hard wearing.

This site offers fast turnaround at a great price on the Humanscale Freedom Chair with headrest or without headrest both include free shipping too.