The BabyBjorn High Chair is an excellent, easy-to-use high chair that provides fantastic support, is easy to clean and is beautifully designed. It’s not cheap, but is a great choice, especially for style conscious homes.
BabyBjorn High Chair Review
Coupling Scandinavian design and functional practicality BabyBjorn has long been the big name in terms of baby carriers but they also have products in other areas. The highchair is one of this expanded product line and aims to bring this combination of qualities to baby mealtimes.
Design
The first thing that hits you with the highchair is the design. The moulded plastic chair provides all the support you need but looks like something more at home in the Tate Modern rather than a busy family home. The simplicity of the design works regardless of whether it is surrounded by equally design conscious items or the more colourful accoutrements of children.
The chair is made of a single piece with four legs that slot into the bottom of the chair. These can be removed for ease of transportation, or folded together for everyday storage.
The chair also has a table that lifts up and locks in place, doubling as the restraint to hold the child in the chair. This can slide forward and back to accommodate larger or smaller children. The table has a removable top so you can easily take it off and wash it in the sink post-meal.
Our favourite thing about the design is the lack of fabric straps, making it not only less fiddly to get a child into, but also a lot easier to clean with everything wipe clean and stain resisitant.
Stability
The four splayed legs provide a large base area and help provide it with a lot of stability. While we’d be wary of saying it is impossible for any child to tip the high chair (our experience with children is never say never) it is as stable as any high chair we’ve seen and we’d put it in the safest category. Each leg also has a wide plastic foot that provides decent grip, stopping the chair being shuffled across the floor and preventing the leg marking your floors.
Ease of use
With only one action to lock your child in place it is very easy to use. There is still a bit of a trick to it and you will need two hands – getting them in the seat and holding them in place while lifting the table, then twisting the lock underneath until the table clicks in place – but it’s as easy as securing a squirming child can ever be.
Getting them out is equally easy as once you’ve turned the lock the table will naturally fall forward so you just hold the child in place until the table is out of the way and then just lift them clear.
Cleaning
Everything about the chair is wipe clean so cleaning is fairly simple. The removable tray also means the majority of leftovers can quickly be transported to the sink and rinsed off and easily washed. The shape of the back of the chair does potentially help reduce the amount of food smeared around the side, although our tester proved with enough enthusiasm he could get food deposits pretty much anywhere so the fully wipe clean nature is still appreciated.
Price
At almost £200 (although it can be found for closer to £180) it is very much not a cheap option and there are very capable models available a lot cheaper, although none that we would consider offering the same combination of style and practicality. The ultra cheap Ikea high chair is worth a look if saving money is the most important factor for you. It might not share the same style or be quite as easy to use, but it is more than capable of doing the job.
Verdict
We were very impressed with the BabyBjorn high chair and even considering its relatively high price tag we have no trouble recommending it. You won’t find a better-looking highchair and this style doesn’t come at the expense of practicality or safety. If it’s within your budget, it is an excellent choice.