Quote Originally Posted by Alex Bragi
The above surely would have had more umph as, "She stood there nude leaning forward over the back of a heavy wood chair."
The other reason your version works better is there are fewer words. One of the most effective (and easiest) ways to edit a story is to see how many words you can take out without changing the meaning. Shorter sentences have more impact. As an example, you can improve the rewrite even more by taking out the word "there".