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Our Sam Rittenberg showroom is open Monday to Saturday, 10am – 6pm. Walk in, or book time with a furniture specialist.
A rustic walnut executive desk on solid slab ends with a beaded front edge, and a scroll-arm office chair, in a Craftsman bungalow study
Office · Scene

The Edge Is the Whole Argument

A rustic walnut executive desk standing on solid slab ends, with a rippled run of beads worked along the whole of its front edge.
The Edge Is the Whole Argument

One edge is doing all the decoration in this room.

The rest of the desk is plain — two slabs, two drawers, no carving. Then the front edge turns into a run of stacked beads and the piece stops being a box. Pick one place to spend the detail. Come and run your hand along it.

Explore
Every piece is built to order in the wood and finish you choose. Visit the showroom and we will gladly price it for you.
A walnut slab desk with a rippled bead edge running its length, with a cherry scroll-arm chair pulled out
Desk and chair
A walnut slab desk with the beaded edge running its length, and a scroll-arm chair pulled out.
A rustic walnut desk on two solid slab end panels, its front edge worked into a run of stacked half-round beads
The desk alone
Two solid walnut slabs carrying a top whose front edge is a row of stacked half-round beads.
An office chair with curved wooden scroll arms and oatmeal tweed upholstery on a five-armed wooden base
The office chair
Curved wooden scroll arms in cherry, oatmeal tweed, and a five-armed wooden base on castors.
A close view along a walnut desk edge made of stacked convex half-round beads, each catching its own highlight
Bead after bead
Rounded ridges stacked along the front edge, each one taking its own highlight as the north light crosses them.
A close view of a coarse oatmeal tweed arm pad stitched down against the polished curve of a cherry scroll arm
Tweed on cherry
A coarse wheat tweed arm pad stitched down against the polished turn of a cherry scroll.
Close-up of the turned spindles and shaped crest rail of a black painted dining chair against the oak table
Meet the maker

FN Chairs

LaGrange, Indiana

FN Chairs started building chairs in 1995, in LaGrange, Indiana, and has done almost nothing else since. That narrowness is the point. A shop that builds case goods and chairs will usually be better at the case goods, because a chair is the hardest ordinary thing in a house to get right — it has to take a person’s whole weight, at an angle, several times a day, on four legs and a few sticks.

Freeman Miller started it and the family still runs it, with a second generation now in the business. The trade association that represents the Indiana shops describes them as an innovator in hardwood chair design, which in this corner of the industry is not a phrase handed out casually.

What arrives on our floor from them is seating: dining chairs, arm chairs, bar stools, desk chairs. They come in the species and finish you choose, which is how a chair like the Concord ends up painted black in one house and left natural in oak in the next.

Read their story
When a room brings together pieces from more than one workshop, we name each of them.
Built by
Ashton executive desk
Sharp Run Wood
Roxbury arm desk chair
FN Chairs
Shown in

Rustic walnut, knots kept

Rustic grade means the knots, the sapwood streaks and the small checks stay in the board instead of being cut out of it. On a desk this size that is the difference between a surface and a piece of timber you keep looking at. Ask in store for everything available.
Colors look different on every screen. Visit the showroom to see real samples and find the right match for your home.
Ask about colors
A close view along a walnut desk edge made of stacked convex half-round beads, each catching its own highlight
This room’s style

Traditional

See more rooms in this style, from living and dining to bedroom and outdoor.
Explore other styles
Classic Painted
Coastal Lowcountry
Farmhouse & Reclaimed
Live Edge & Sculptural
Mission & Craftsman
Modern Organic
Shaker Heritage
Back to the collection
Back to the style world
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Ask about this room

Tell us which pieces you love and the colors you have in mind. A furniture specialist will get back to you with options and lead times, or you can book a visit and see everything in person.
1750 Sam Rittenberg Blvd, Charleston SC · (843) 225-2513