Paracord camp chair

This time we are making a paracord camp chair!If you need a comfortable, simple chair for use when camping, bushcrafting, fishing, carving or even just relaxing in the backyard, then this chair is a good fit for you.
The chair can be made out of a few poles, sticks and some paracord. The tools needed don’t have to be fancy either. A knife and a saw/axe will do the job. Naturally, having a drill, a chain saw or power tools makes things a lot easier.

This style of a camp chair is also called a camp stool. The design for this one comes out of Rope Works Plus, a book by Gerald L. Findley. I had to adapt a few things to make it work with paracord and it turned out great! It is comfortable, looks great and it really invites you to sit on it :).

In the article below you will find the supplies needed, a description of the making process and at the end, a video tutorial covering the entire process.

So, let’s begin!

Supplies

These are the major supplies you will need to make the camp chair:

Besides these building materials, tools are needed. A knife, saw, axe are the basics. So if you are making the chair in a camping, bushcraft or a similar situation, then this is what you will use.

If you are making the chair at home, you will be able to use more advanced tools. A drill, a chain saw, a vise and so on.

So, the situation you are in will determine the tools you have available and how easy it is to make such a chair.

Now, on to a description of the making process.

Making a paracord camp chair

The camp chair is started by taking the three, 2 foot long poles used for the frame and making notches onto both ends of the poles. If you have a drill, make holes instead.

The notches/holes are done parallel on both sides, meaning they face the same direction. The notches should be about 3/4 of an inch deep (19 mm), while the holes are about 1/2 inch in diameter (12mm).

Once done, we lash the poles together at the center using our 15 foot long piece of paracord (4.5m). The result is a nice and stable tripod.

Then we twist our three, 7 foot (2.1 meters) long pieces of paracord into a single piece of rope. This is going to be our support rope at the top of the chair, forming the seat.

We switch to our 10 foot (3 meters) long piece of paracord and use it as a bracing rope. The bracing rope travels through all of the holes/notches in the poles in a zig-zag pattern. To do this pass your cord through a hole at the bottom, then through a hole at the top of a pole, then back to the bottom and so on. Eventually, the two ends are going to meet.

Now the ends of both cords need to be joined. I recommend that you join the cords of your top, support rope first. Use the double sheet bend to do so and make sure that the cord is tight. Secure each end with an additional half hitch for added security.

Then join the two ends of the bracing cord, again using a double sheet bend.

Finally, we are going to form the seat. Take your sticks which are about 1/2 a foot in diameter. Insert them one by one into the lay of the top rope. We lift one strand in the lay of the rope and insert our stick. With each stick we need to do this two times.

To make inserting sticks a bit easier, you can use a fid (it is easy to carve one yourself) or you can sharpen up the sticks, making them easier to push through your top rope.

Naturally, a text description only goes so far. See the making process live in the video below.