One of my favorite lights originated in the New York City underground at the turn of the last century. Subway lights epitomize the early industrial style with their strong utilitarian lines and their clever solution to a unique problem – how do you keep a glass shade from shaking loose in an environment full of vibration? As far as I can tell these lights weren’t used on the subway cars themselves (early photos show only bare bulbs in the subway cars), although the same solution was used for lights on more posh train cars of the era. But the subway platforms provided enough vibration that...

After the purchase of a new home or when nearing the end of a remodeling project many of our customers are excited to shop for lighting and forget to come prepared. Selecting the proper lighting for a space requires several important factors that if thought out before hand can make browsing through our nearly 1,000 lights on display a less overwhelming experience. Of course matching the style and era of a light fixture to your home is top of the list in making a decision, but these other important factors will weigh heavily on the process of  making the perfect choice: Scale – The most...

One category of our industrial lights are termed “Explosion Proof” which leads many people to wonder why you’d need to design a light to survive an  explosion. But in truth, they get their name from how they are designed to avoid catastrophe. Explosion Proof light fixtures are designed to completely encase the hot lamp in an air tight environment so volatile gasses in a factory work room, from such things as spray paint or heavily used solvents, won’t make contact with the socket and spark an explosion.   To ensure this the lights are designed using heavy cast aluminum...

An earlier post focused on the new laws aroung light bulbs and I mentioned how LED would likely by the winning technology for our future. Here’s an article from Fastcompany.com that explains the inner workings of an LED light bulb: Fifty Bucks For A Lightbulb? Say Hello To LED Bulbs The prices on LED light bulbs has already begun to shift downward – I recently purchased one from a big box retaile for under $20. The color isn’t that great, especially when compared to the incandescents we’re used to that have a more reddish hue. But the technology is definately more promising than...

Here’s a website posting to some information that will hopefully clear up a few questions about the new laws going into effect for energy efficient light bulbs. http://shine.yahoo.com/green/truth-light-bulb-law-200200491.html The question comes up around here quite often as to what is going to happen. As  you’ll read from the article the change is going to happen, but it won’t be abrupt.  Higher wattage bulbs will be phased out over time: “Old incandescents will not be taken off store shelves on January 1, but phased out as they are sold off. The old 75-watt incandescent...

Camphor glass has a cloudy white – sort of grayish actually – color which makes some also call them “clam broth” shades and is produced by exposing glass to hydrofluoric acid vapors. Camphor glass gained wide popularity during the mid 19th Century and was often used for jewelry and decorative items for the home such as vases, decanters and candle sticks, but it also had wide use for light shades. When unlit the light shades have a distinctive grayish appearance with a soft luminance, but when lit they show up as an off white. Most camphor glass shades are quite thick and...

So often the lights we sell get picked up or sent away and we’re only left with our imaginations to wonder how they fit in with their new surroundings. So, its always a great treat to find our fixtures beautifully photographed in their new setting such as I’ve found here: http://remodelista.com/posts/steal-this-look-mill-valley-loft-style-kitchen Its also a great endorsement that Allison, the homeowner of the project, is also an editor at Remodelista – a great source for design inspiration and product sources. We sell a lot of industrial lighting for kitches for several reasons....

Sometimes customers in our antique lighting shop ask me for fixtures in which they can use a very high amount of wattage. First off is that most vintage light fixtures aren’t designed from an aesthetic point of view to look good with excessively high amount of wattage – for instance, delicate gas shades begin to look “blown out” once you use more than 40 watts. But second is that if you rely on a single fixture for too much light it will create harsh, unflattering shadows. The better solution is to make sure that there is a balance of light in each room by using multiple...

When a light fixture is brought into our shop for restoration it is often disassembled, stripped and polished – but never lacquered. We, and our customers, prefer to let fixtures age naturally so the brass in time turns to an honest honey hue. But what if over time the fixture needs some cleaning? First, we never recommend the use of harsh solvents or cleaners on a vintage light except during a major restoration when necessary. So, for a light already installed the best solution we’ve found is to use the finest steel wool available in the hardware store. Its rated “oooo” –...

In June of this year Frank Donegan published a wonderful in depth profile of PW Vintage Lighting in the Maine Antique Digest. The article is titled In the Trade: Adam Watson, PW Vintage Lighting, Great Barrington, Massachusetts and gives a pretty good look into what our business is about. Frank did an excellent job of showing how we are different from most other antique dealers. Great job...

  Before Edison perfected the incandescent lightbulb a much lesser known technology was used to create electric light. Carbon Arch Lamps were manufactured as early as the 1850′s but not until a few technical advances of their own did they find wider use beginning in the 1870′s. Arc lamps generated light by passing electricity between two carbon rods. The lamp was ignited with the rods touching and then were slowly drawn apart until a bright illuminating arc developed. The carbon rods would eventually burn down and need to be replaced after only about 80 hours of use, but the light they...

Originally slag glass was produced by combining slag from an iron ore furnace with glass which produced an opaque glass used to produce decorative items. But the term has been applied more recently to a late 19th Century style which combined two colors of glass into a marbled, textured product often using greens and browns. This translucent glass when illuminated produces a very dramatic effect while emitting a soft and pleasing glow. Some believe that this style of combining the various colors of glass together came about when at the end of a work day the smaller batches of remaining molten glass...