Swivel rockers deliver perfect combination of style, comfort

A great chair can change your life. OK, I know that sounds a bit overdramatic, but seriously, if you have a comfy place to sit, think of the implications.

■ You would make time to settle in with a good book and refill your tank in the process. Then you could use all that new energy to run a marathon or volunteer at a homeless shelter. Right?

■ You would linger longer over conversation with great friends because you wouldn’t want to get up, and, eventually you all would come up with solutions to all the world’s problems. World peace, at last!

■ You would catch up on the news, the hit TV shows and the big game, so you would have lots to talk about around the water cooler at work. As a result, you would be so politically well-connected, chances are you would win that promotion or big raise. Imagine!

See how your fortunes could change just because of a great chair? Here’s the chair that can deliver all that powerful comfort (but the world-altering results will be up to you).

For most of us, gone are the days when we wanted more formal furnishings that look sensational but are no fun to sit on. The world is getting more casual, and we want furniture that allows us to live our real life, something we can tuck our feet up under, snuggle in and check our Facebook page on our phones. For me, that chair is a swivel glider.

I never thought I would sell a swivel glider at Nell Hill’s (a home interior store in the Midwest). In my mind, these chairs were something my grandmother would love in her home, but not me. Then the motion revolution began, and furniture designers mashed together blissful comfort with head-turning styling and created the chair you are proud to have in your home (and that you can hardly pry yourself out of).

Our rep for CR Laine reports that their motion chairs are so popular now that they account for half of their sales. I won’t get into the nuts and bolts of how these chairs are made, but they are carefully designed to deliver melting comfort to everyone from a petite 5-foot-6 woman to a big old 6-foot-2 man.

When I started carrying swivel gliders, I was amazed when our customers in their 20s and 30s went wild over them. But it makes sense — they don’t have the “this is my grandmother’s chair” perceptions about motion chairs, like I did. Instead, they saw all the lovely classic and contemporary lines and wide mix of fabrics and trim, and they fell in love.

Young moms are loving motion chairs for their nurseries and families are using them in their hearth rooms or family room. As husbands patiently wait for their wives as they shop, they flop down in our swivel gliders and melt in, happy as clams. All they need is a TV with a game on, and they would never want to leave.

My husband, Dan, and I have two swivel gliders in our basement TV room for that very reason. Me? I’m glued there, too, with my legs tucked up under me, snuggled under a throw rug, watching old movies.

This column was adapted from Mary Carol Garrity’s blog at www.nellhills.com. She can be reached at marycarol@nellhills.com.