A Vintage Miracle
My online vintage lighting store.
In an antique store, the owner really wanted me to buy a fixture. It originally had a large center glass shade, and three smaller glass shades hanging down.
But the smaller shades were missing. The center shade had a dazzling wheel-cut starburst pattern and I explained that trying to find matching smaller shades was next to impossible.
Wandering through the store, which had a lot of lighting, I glanced at a fixture that was the opposite of the previous fixture: it retained its small shades but was missing the large center shade. I thought: Gee, I wish these small shades matched the other large shade! Then I looked again.
And again.
And blinked.
Noooo, it wasn’t possible.
But…it was:
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My online vintage lighting store.
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Yeah. He had one with shades and one without so he split them up to sell two fixtures. So, did you have to buy both or was he willing to move the three small shades to the other fixture to make it complete?
I have something similar to this only the outer chains had nothing to hang a shade from. I read that bare bulbs were often hung this way just to show off that you had electric lighting. I ended up switching out the center shade for for one a bit larger, than I added some collars to the chains to hold some shades and bought three that reasonably match the center. I have a large dining room so I needed a large vintage light. I’m happy with it. But I do love that wheel cut glass. If I didn’t already have a light I would buy that for my dining room.
Hi, mlaiuppa!
I’m confident that the antique dealer didn’t switch out the shades. I mean, two incomplete fixtures have almost no vale. But one complete fixture has value.
In addition, he never does anything with his buys. He, and his business partner of three decades, scour Kansas for yard sales, estate sales, and so on. It all gets taken to their store and warehouse, and everything is sold AS IS.
I’ve passed on the fixtures for years.
In thinking about it, I would guess that the two fixtures came from the same house.
And I was only charged for one fixture, as completed.
Such a wonderful miracle! Beautiful… 🙂
Bravo Ross, excellent eye!