1930s Reflector Floor Lamp

[RetroToday]

Felt quite excited when I picked this lamp up at a garage sale last weekend for a great price. Had wanted one of these for some time to go with my overall collection of vintage household stuff. Thought I'd share pics of it here with you fine folks.

Replaced a few of the burnt out lightbulbs when I got it home, works like a charm. There are six light bulbs in this lamp and three separate switches.
With that many bulbs this lamp becomes quite a big heat source when they're all turned on at full intensity. Great for warming up a room on a cold winter day!

A rather large light bulb sits in the top torchiere, the switch is meant for a tri-light bulb, you can turn it to 100 200 or 300 watts.

I put three 40 watt decorative bulbs in the sockets that surround the torchiere. The sockets of these are meant to have the appearance of candles, fake wax drippings decorate the sides. The three lights are in a tri-light sequence so that with the first click one bulb lights up, two on the second click and three on the third click.

There are also two bulbs in the base to light up the beautiful onyx inserts. Onyx is a form of quartz, so the base of the lamp is quite heavy. I love leaving just the onyx base turned on, the glow through the onyx is a little hypnotic. All the metallic parts of this lamp are made of steel which was given a faux-bronze "antiqued" finish at the factory.

I have a few more photos of it in my gallery at this link.

Same view as top photo, but with the top 'reflector' shade turned on, and a little ambient sunlight creeping into the room.

 

[NicknNora]

Nice lamp! I have one similar to it but it needs to be rewired and I need a shade. It's one of my "one of these days" projects. lol

 

[PoohBang]

that lamp is unbelievable! I love it!

 

[dhermann1]

Sweet! I have a very similar one, not in quite as nice condition, tho. You should be able to find the small bulbs that actually have flamey shapes to them somewhere. I messed with mine and rewired it wrong so it does the high, then the low, then both lights. As you said, that's a project for some day. The big bulb in the middle is called a Mogul bulb. I also have a dimmer that sits on the floor and is controlled by toe, and can turn on all the lights at once and dim them down. One other nice feature is that little night light. Is the switch at the base so you can turn it on and off with your foot? That's onyx I believe in the base that has that nice translucent quality.
This style lamp is one of those real iconic "of the era" things that sort of define a vintage interior. Congrats! Thanks for sharing.

 

[Guttersnipe]

That lamp is so cool it ought to have it's own zip code

 

[RetroToday]

Thanks guys,

dhermann1:

The switch for the night light is at the top with the other switches on my lamp.
I did see the flame bulbs in the store recently, before I found the lamp. Will have to go pick up a few soon.

Was told by an older friend that the original flame shaped bulbs that were meant for these lamps had a multicoloured translucent tint painted on the surface to make them look slightly more like a real flame. They don't make those ones anymore, I also hear that the companies which still make the clear bulbs today are continually threatening to discontinue making them.

As we all know, the classic lightbulb itself may soon be banned altogether by our Governments. I cringe at the thought of being forced to one day put some ugly modern bulb in the more visible sockets.

*A Little Update/Edit: Since posting this thread I've been searching through 1930s newspapers in an effort to find the exact lamp featured in advertisements.
There were earlier, similar lamps, but "Seven-Way Light Reflector Floor Lamps" were introduced around 1938 - that is what my lamp is.
Makes sense the lamps was under that description: there are three ways to click the Mogul light, three ways to click the flame lights and one way (on/off) for the night light = Seven Ways.

The earlier style of this type of lamp only had three ways and the onyx base never had a light bulb inside.

 

[RetroToday]

Another vintage newspaper ad for a seven way reflector lamp. This one from 1938 describes the extra lights as a new feature of this style of lamp.

Side note: This image was cropped from a full page ad by Eaton's College Street department store of Toronto. The building still exists, many of the beautiful interior architectural features designed by the famed Jacques Carlu. http://www.thecarlu.com/thecarlu.html

 

[kampkatz]

There are reflector table lamps still available today, but with a retro look.
There is one in our church narthex which is used frequently.