Featured Notes on a Victorian lamp Save

The 1890's wrought oil lamps are most often seen in 45" inch tall piano lamp versions. This stylish table parlor example I found was pulled from 100 years of cellar storage. The burner is marked Fostoria. As with most such late Victorian wrought lighting, it's mild steel not iron. The basket twist leg ends are particularly well done. It actually took metalworking skill to make these lamps. Will do a full refurbish, find a antique ball glass shade & chimney.
I keep telling myself to stop buying lamps, but can't seem to stop.

 

Beautiful steel work.

 

They are stunning, perfect work in steel.

 

I have an old B&H lamp an' its adjustable stand, which I may have shown here some time ago**. I don't know how to differentiate between wrought Iron an' Steel without grinding to look at spark patterns, or some kind of acid analysis. How do you tell that difference, Drew?

**https://www.antiquers.com/threads/b...le-floor-lamp-what-pattern-name-please.85803/

 

The taper on those curls are beautiful. I love that look.

That is a really nice lamp. Please share the pics after you refurbish.

 

I was raised by a rail nut into live steam. That meant oil lanterns. I honestly never knew there was such a thing as too many oil lamps. Clean that baby up and light it off! She wants to run!

 

Huh...News to me, too!

 

Yes, testing is an absolute way to tell, steel has a higher carbon content for strength & ease of production. Looking at it has a grain pattern from being worked. From what I've seen steel became king for higher volume products in the 1880-1910 period. If you look at most late Victorian lamps such as these, the pieces which they're formed from are smooth with no imperfections - what you see with high volume production steel. Of course craftsmen continued using iron back then, and still do today for it's workability. In the end, the difference is only a 2-3% carbon difference between iron & steel. Today, folks broadly use the term wrought iron for both iron & steel which is fine - purists and dedicated craftsman can be particular. There are online sources with details on all this, but it gets quite technical, even scientific.

 

Thanks...I think my B&H is late enough to be considered steel.

 

I have a dozen antique oil lamps which visitors have mistaken for decor. Nope. Cape Cod gets big wind storms with power outages. All my lamps are cleaned, new oil, new wicks and ready for a storm. Much safer than candles.

 

Wisdom...almost certainly shared in practice by the majority of your neighbors!

 

[QUOTE="I keep telling myself to stop buying lamps, but can't seem to stop. View attachment 543381 [/QUOTE]

I had a lamp thing going for a while. Could not help buying more and more lamps.

I switched to jewelry. (Much easier to store.)

Cool design on that lamp!

 

These became popular in the 1885-95 period. B & H made some nice wrought lamps, they had a top shelf team of designers and made some very pretty lamps. I'm a fan of these lamps.... the forming and joining via rivets of up to 25 pieces - not a simple cast spelter or a glass base. Reflects golden age of metalwork.

 

Yes, I agree. Much high craft, in many decorative fields.

 

Nice lamp! Have bought a few oil lamps over the last couple years because they were very cheap. Have had a few in the store and have not sold a single one despite being priced well below similar on ebay. I will continue to buy nice examples if dirt cheap, but it is probably a fool's errand

 

I just sold a smaller and much plainer version of this type of lamp. It was only 12" tall overall. I bought a large portion of what I think was a collector and restorer's collection. It was interesting to do the research.