[spearce]

My wife and I are both 5'3". Standard height furniture of 48" is just far too tall to sit in, as it wrecks the surround sound field. I'm looking at the Berkline furniture, but the 090's (and all others) are 41" tall, also much higher than we are (when seated anyway).


How much of an issue is it that the chair backs are taller than we are ?


Anyone have any suggestions on shorter furniture? Jaymar seems to build their chairs at 38" tall (much better for us), but I don't want to pay the Bass Industries tax...


I'm looking for leather/leatherplus with a good recliner mechanism. My last "viewing" furniture was a far too overpriced recliner from Ashely that broke after about 2 years. I definately got ripped off on that and don't want to repeat it... (Apparently for what I paid on the Ashely crap I could have gotten a dang nice set of Berklines.)

 

[MS]

At 5'5" and my wife 4'11", one of my main requisites for seating in our theater was sofas that were comfortable for us to sit in and gave us good body, neck and head support at all recline angles. We tend to be very choosy about sofa selection for our body size whenever we purchase a sofa. I chose these leather match reclining sofas at Rooms to Go, because they were far and away more comfortable for us shorter people than any of the others that we sat in. They are holding up well, but I was not real concerned about the durability issue because my theatre is a dedicated room.


I sat in just about every other reclining sofa in town prior to purchasing, and couldnt find one where the cushioning fit us better than these. Everyone that sits in them and hits the recline mechanism wows about how great they are to watch a movie in. The only downside of them is that you cant go into the room tired, or you will never stay awake to see the end of the movie!


I have never measured the back height, but our side surround channels sit almost even with the front row, and I dont yet have rear surrounds, although I did prewire for them. So for us the back height doesnt seem to be an issue as far as sound. Not sure how you can have a reclining sofa without head support in the reclining position, though. Photos in the link below.


Back height is roughly 39". If I remember correctly there is a guarantee on the reclining mechanism. These go for $999.00 each.

 

[EC]

I'm no Shaq either at 5'9. currently I'm using leather Ikea Tullsta chairs and they are only 32" high but don't provide a whole lot of back support but they are still very comfy nonetheless. I can hear everything well. I will be replacing these chairs and have looked at the Irwin Ambassador lounger but when I sit in this chair my ears are literally just above the seat back. If I can get a good price on this I may go for these. The other chair(s) I am looking at are made by "Nutazzia", a leather furniture maker out of Italy. They make a reclining barber style chair that has a barber style head rest that can pop up. When the headrest is the down position the top of the chair stops at around my shoulders. Perfect fit. The only thing is that these are not HT seats per se. Another downside is that these chairs have two positions: fully recline back with footrest or are in a non recline position. The other small downside to these chairs are that it takes 2 - 3 months from time of make. But these are still high on my list.