Office chairs and desks are designed for humans to sit in, for hours at a time. Unfortunately the majority of these objects are terribly unfit for purpose.

This post documents customizations I’ve made to improve the experience of sitting.

Chair

Armrest Drop Risers

My main desk chair is a Staples Ayalon. I went to Staples, sat in every chair, and found this one most comfortable. It had a few issues - first, the armrests were too high.

I have longish arms - most office chairs have armrests that are too high, leading to a shrugged shoulder position. Sitting like this over time creates issues.

To lower the armrests on the Staples Ayalon, I 3D printed some lowering blocks from black PETG and bought longer hardware to match.

Headrest

The Ayalon also lacks a headrest. This was a major con, and I realized it while testing chairs. But the Ayalon fit better everywhere else, so I bought it anyway.

The Ayalon does have threaded inserts where a headrest might go, but apparently a headrest was never actually produced for it.

To add a headrest, I purchased this generic headrest from Amazon.

It comes with a clamp …

…to attach to the chair …

… but unfortunately the back of the Ayalon is not square.

The headrest also has mounting holes…

But these don’t line up with the mounting threads on the Ayalon.

So I 3D printed a bracket to attach it to the chair - same black PETG as the armrest risers.

The benefit of printing the custom bracket was being able to position the headrest exactly where I wanted it.

Many headrests end up too high, making contact with the back of the head.

I’ve always found this uncomfortable. I prefer a headrest supporting the neck.

$600 chair? or $200 chair and a 3D printer?

Desk

My desk frame is a VIVO DESK-V100EB.

I’ve had it for several years, with various desk surfaces attached.

Drop risers for desk casters

I prefer a low desk surface, mostly for the sake of a low keyboard position.

The VIVO desk frame gets almost low enough, if it’s directly on the ground. However, it’s nice to be able to move the desk easily. The legs are threaded for adjustable static feet - I found some casters on Amazon that match the thread.

The casters raise the desk height by about 3 inches. This is too high. One option is to raise the chair height, but then my feet are not flat on the ground. Another option is to raise the chair armrests, but this creates a problematic shrugged shoulder position.

The only real solution is lowering the desk, while keeping the casters. I’m in the process of making drop risers for the desk casters.