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Trade terms for professionals and design studios
Two pages of the Libera Soft Executive catalogue carry the same badge: BIG SEE Product Design Award, Winner. A won award, not a nomination, and Vaghi prints it for this armchair alone; the polypropylene chairs of the same family show other marks. The form behind it reads from the doorway: a padded shell with the arms built in, a headrest that comes as standard, upholstery in one colour or in two. Next to most Italian executive armchairs it looks almost quiet, and that is a position, not an omission.
Vaghi builds it on two aluminium bases. The five-star one has rubber castors, a seat that adjusts in height and a central-pivot tilting mechanism; the four-star one swivels on felt glides and keeps one height.
The rest of the family is easiest to follow by what each chair stands on. Libera Soft, the padded multipurpose chair, comes on four legs, on a sled, on elliptical or solid beech legs, on a four-star swivel base or on five castors; with its writing tablet and linking elements it becomes meeting-room seating. The polypropylene shell, bare or with a seat cushion, takes the same bases, and the bench version stands on a beam. The design is by Orlandini Design, 2019. La Mercanti puts the award on the specification sheet and asks the client to sit before judging, because a prize is read in a minute and a backrest in an hour.
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By one kilo, yes. Vaghi declares 20 kg for the four-star version on felt glides and 19 kg for the five-star version on castors, and packs each armchair in its own carton of 0.58 m³. On delivery day the volume counts for more than the weight: ten armchairs make 5.8 m³ of cartons, which decides how many trips the lift takes and how much corridor is needed while the floor is being set up.
They are three of the nine fabrics Vaghi lists for the Libera range: Leiria, Radio, Belem, Lagos, Oporto, Norfolk, Zenith, Bogotà Melange and Wilson. Next to them sit Guatemala, Rio, Natural Leather and Grain Leather in the leather and vinyl group. The name is what goes on the order, and on the two-tone version two names may appear. A cloth supplied by the client is also accepted, once Vaghi has checked that it can be worked and how much of it is needed.
One Libera can. Vaghi offers a self-centring column as an option on the swivel chair with the four-star base in polished aluminium, padded or in polypropylene. It is offered on that base only; the four-star bases in black or white polyamide take a different option, castors. Around a meeting table this is the detail that keeps a row of swivel chairs looking ordered after people have stood up, without anyone going round to straighten them.
The line follows the upholstery. The bare polypropylene shell, Libera LI, and the bench with bare shells, LP, carry the Italian ministerial approval in class 1. As soon as there is padding the class becomes 1IM: the LC with its seat cushion, the LS bench with cushions, the padded Libera Soft and the Soft Executive itself. When a specification names a fire class, the answer depends on whether the chair is upholstered, not on which line it comes from.
Vaghi says so in its own words: the writing tablet and the linking device make Libera Soft suited to classrooms and meeting rooms. The tablet is removable, in polypropylene with an anti-panic joint and a metal support, made for right-handed or left-handed users, and it fits the sled versions with or without arms. The linking elements, supplied in pairs, hold the same chairs in straight rows. Before the chairs are stacked the tablet comes off, so one room moves from lecture to meeting without changing chairs.
What changes the first time you sit on the five-star Libera Soft Executive: seat height, recline, headrest, arm height and castors, each one set against what Vaghi declares.
On the five-star Libera Soft Executive the seat rises from 450 to 570 mm (17.7 to 22.4 in), a travel of 120 mm. Start from the desk rather than from the chair: with the seat set so that the forearms reach the worktop without lifting the shoulders, the rest of this list falls into place. The four-star version stays at 450 mm, so the desk has to suit it.
The five-star version reclines: Vaghi fits it with its standard tilting mechanism on a central pivot. Try it on the first day leaning back during a phone call rather than sitting upright at the screen, because that is when it gets used. The four-star version on felt glides swivels but does not recline, so this setting concerns the castor model only.
Vaghi lists both versions as armchairs with headrest, so there is nothing to add to the order. Reclined, the head meets it at the top of the shell; upright, it stays behind and leaves the neck free. Total height is 1080 mm on both versions, and up to 1200 mm on the five-star one with the seat at the top of its travel.
The arms are part of the padded shell, so they rise and fall with the seat. On the five-star version they sit between 660 and 780 mm from the floor, the same 120 mm of travel as the seat; on the four-star version they stay at 660 mm. Check them against the edge of the desk: the forearm should slide onto the worktop, not hit it.
The five-star base runs on rubber castors 65 mm across, with column, base and castors in white or black, or a polished base with a chromed column. The four-star version stands on polypropylene tips with felt glides: it swivels in place and is moved by hand. On the first day look at the floor under the desk and decide which of the two the room really needs.
