We’ve seen carmakers taking dips into the office chair market, with products commanding immense premiums. One that immediately comes to mind was the one by Mercedes-AMG, with its EUR 3,500 (~RM16,246) AMG Office Chair from back in 2022. A bit more recently, Toyota has made its own, with its own take on ridiculous premium furniture. It’s called the “Crown Seat” Desk Chair, and the name is a lot more on the nose than you’d think.
This is because the seat itself is based off of the powered front seat of a Toyota Crown. Actually, it may be more accurate to say that it literally is the chair rather than being based on it. This is because it retains most of the features from the actual car, including reclining, height adjustment, and even a front tilt for the base. Beyond that, there’s lumbar support, with heaters and ventilation built in as well.
What’s extra hilarious is that Toyota has left the seatbelt buckle on the left side there in its office incarnation. There’s no actual seatbelt, so the buckle now takes a USB-C cable instead. That the buckle is on the left side suggests that this would have been the driver’s seat on the actual Crown car.
Toyota, via the Toyota Boshoku subsidiary that does automotive interior systems, worked with Japanese furniture company Itoki for the chair. The latter is the one providing the bottom half, which includes the armrest, as well as handling height adjustment. The Crown Seat is only sold via the former’s premium Crown retail chain, making it a Japan-exclusive. Even then, the brand says it only plans to make 70 of these, and they would be made to order.
If you’re among those 70, Carscoops reports that you’ll still need to shell out JPY495,000 (~RM12,288) for it. If demand exceeds supply, more may be made, but buyers will be chosen by lottery.
(Source: Toyota [1], [2], [3, PDF], Carscoops)
