Review: NOMINELL Swivel Chair
November 29, 2007 ~ Reviews
We bought a couple of these NOMINELL chairs two years ago for our home office. We thought it was the best choice in terms of looks price and comfort. I seat on my work chair 8 hours a day so comfort is a must. Alternatives included the JULES (I didn’t feel like I could sit on one of these for more than a couple hours a day), the SVENNING (yuk!), etc.
So after a couple years of intensive use I can tell you this:
- The fabric it is made of is really tough. Our cat is climbing up and sharpening her claws on it all the time, yet it doesn’t have a single scratch or mark.
- The base spins very smoothly.
- The wheels don’t get stuck with dust and hair. This happened a lot with our previous chairs and we had to clean them every now and then.
- The arms get dirty easily and are hard to clean. If the fabric was kitty proof, the arms aren’t, mine are full of nibble holes and scratches.
- The base squeaks a little when you move.
- The hydraulic system fails sometimes and lifts up a little bit overnight.
Despite a couple tiny problems like the squeaking this is a pretty good chair and we’re happy with them. Ratings below:
Comments
Welcome to the IKEA blog block!
I run OHIKEA.com, come on over, we’re just about Ohio’s incoming store though. I added you to the blogroll and blogged you being here, you should see some hits!
Hi Jen,
Thanks a lot for the mention! I just added you to our blogroll as well.
I have a JULES chair. I like it, but it is a bit too hard to sit on it all day. I recently got a RUTGER chair, which uses the JULES swivel base. I’m extremely happy with it. I’d suggest trying it.
I took the swivel base off of my JULES and put it on the RUTGER. (I wish more IKEA products were compatible like that.) Then I bought a new non-swivel base for the JULES.
I had one of these until it snapped a couple of weeks ago. The backrest is attached using two pieces of tubular steel ; where the steel is crushed flat to push the bolts through, it fatigues the metal ; it just couldn’t cope with the force of me leaning back on it and broke off. I think it lasted about five years though.
I’ve replaced it with a Markus.
1) A mere £4 more.
2) The backrest is held on by a whacking great bit of solid steel with 7 bolts in it.
3) The backrest and seat have an independant gas cylinder – the backrest actually pivots with repect to the seat which the Nominell does not.
The variability in back posture will help me enormously.
Having seen both chairs I can’t help thinking the Markus is rather a bargain at £99 compared to the Nominell at £95.
I can’t imagine what induced me to buy the Nominell over the Markus in the first place, unless it was unavailable at the time, or much more expensive. The Markus has a more robust design and better features in my opinion.. in addition to the pivoting backrest, the backrest is long with a headrest, so you can really lean back and enjoy it, the back is mesh to help keep you cool, etc. And the covers are leather.
Silly me though, I bought a new pack of Punkt castors when I could have just ripped off the old ones and used them. One bit of Ikea chairs that are compatible with everything else .. if you could remove the seat from the cylinder easily and buy an SKU without the cylinder and legs, that would be even better. And it’s a shame that people are too stupid to read instructions (which must surely be why they pack hard-floor castors in the box by default ; it would be nice to have a castor-free SKU and choose the castors you need instead of having to buy an extra set).
Just wanted to say thanks for writing this review up! I work from home as well, and have had a couple chairs from OfficeMax and Target in the US. Since moving to the UK, may latest chair has failed me. I’ve been debating on purchasing either the NOMINELL (£83) or the VERKSAM (£145) chair. The NOMINELL is described as suitable for home use, whereas the VERKSAM office use (meaning better for longer use). Glad to hear the NOMINELL is a comfortable and reliable chair for work use, as it will save me about £60!
Hello
I run the website ikea.mu and added you to my blogroll.
Regards
Nice, I was seaching for a review of this chair ^^
You wouldn’t happen to have the INSTRUCTIONS or at least know where to find it… My brother lost the bolts/screws and Manual.
Download the NOMINELL instructions clicking here
Thanks sooo much!!! Now I can buy the screws
I love this chair even though I sliced my hand on the sharp edges on the underside of the chair while do a heft and turn over. I mentioned this problem to Ikea, but they say with numerous trying-to-slice-hands-on-bottom tests there is no problem. Haha. Funny. I had to cut the sharp edges off with an Xacto blade so I didn’t cut myself a third time.
Love the chair! Though it does squeak something awful.