Barber Chair

Q Could you please tell me how much my barber chair is worth? It is white metal and brown leather and says Berninghaus on the footrest.

A Eugene Berninghaus was born in Germany in 1845. He moved with his parents to New York in 1849, then Cincinnati in 1856. Berninghaus also lived for a short time in Chicago but after the 1871 fire, he and his family moved back to Cincinnati where he began making perfumes and barber’s lotions. In 1875, he opened his business, the Eugene Berninghaus Company. It made barber chairs, other barber furniture, and shaving implements from custom-decorated shaving mugs to razors, clippers and shears. Berninghaus died in 1924 and his business lasted until 1938. Berninghaus was the first to design a barber chair that both reclined and revolved, called ”Paragon.” One of his best-known and most collectible models is the Hercules. Its hydraulic mechanism cranks the chair up with a lever, and down when released. Older and more elaborate Berninghaus chairs made with woods like mahogany, oak and walnut can sell for more than $1,000. Chairs like your Berninghaus Hercules model with porcelain coated metal and leather upholstery have sold in poor condition for $100 and in good condition for $400 to $600.