Andrew Heggie wrote:

Traditional Windsor chairs were made up of different woods, beech for the
legs, elm for the seat, oak for the splat (ornate bit at the back rest)
and ash for the hoop. I suspeck ash would have been favourite for the bent
bits.

Thanks very much for the info,
and to the other responder for the site
http://www.windsorchairresources.com/,
even though this is rather US-oriented.

--
Timothy Murphy
e-mail (80k only): tim /at/ birdsnest.maths.tcd.ie
tel: +353-86-2336090, +353-1-2842366
s-mail: School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland