Well, bless my soul!!!!
My late friend has this amazing California wrought iron lamp, and I have tried to find it to share with you all of these years.
Well, I found someone at 1st Dibs selling this amazing lamp.
It's very heavy-duty wrought iron and the wood ball is kind-of floating and turns. Each wood ball is a bit different.
Lawenda also designed a beautiful spring lamp, which starts with a perhaps 14" flat circle and the wrought iron solid pipe wound around, each time a bit smaller in diameter, and it ended up very slender at the top. There was a center tubhe (I think it was aluminum), which held the cord to the light fixture.
I wish I knew more about Lawenda, but his lamps are beautiful and very original in design. Probably late 1950's.
No opinion?
Other than an occasional mention of Glenn of California, hardly anything is ever mentioned here on DA about the really cool non-"regency" modern stuff made in California in the 1950's and early 1960's. There was some fabulous stuff designed.
I believe Greta Magnusson (sorry about the spelling) was a California designer, and wasn't Milo Baughman also out that way?
This ball and cage lamp I greatly admired when my friend had one...he found it in New York City,so it probably was sold there too.
I cannot find any books on California Modern, either.
By the way, the lamp was very solidly made
probably weighted 20 lbs and was absolutely the fatest wrough iron. The wood ball that was on the lamp my friend John had looked like the above, but it had an open knot-like craggy hole on the side, which made it really look like a piece of fine art.
see link for some info on...
see link for some info on lamp maker. http://books.google.com/books?id=FrMj_wenLdcC&pg=PA45&lpg=PA45&dq=Lawend...
http://books.google.com/books?id=FrMj_wenLdcC&pg=PA45&lpg=PA45&dq=Lawend...
No, but thanks
My friend John was from Minneapolis but moved to New York, and we were great friends between 1979 and his death in 1992.
He was a big time junk store shopper and he found lots of great rare stuff long before it became fashionable.
Among the things he had;
* a pair of Paul Frankel metal table lamps (he sold them for $10,000 in 1990)
* an original Nelson desk
* about 15 original vintage Nelson clocks
* the suite of Alexander Girard Braniff sofa and two chairs and two marble side tables, which he bought off the closing Braniff airline office in Minneapolis
A lot of his taste influenced me alot.
I don't know whatever became of his ball and cage lamp, but since 1994, i've been looking for identification on it, and only found the above photograph one day ago....)
Harry Lawenda Lamp
Thank you for the kudos.
I want you to know I'm still alive and breathing.
There were possibly a dozen Lamps design that we made in San Francisco.
The original wood ball was lignum vitae. The original shade has a slight taper. The shade in this photograph has been replaced.
I designed the lamp around 1952
Best
Harry Lawenda
Wow, Mr. Lawenda!
I'm so happy that you're still around and that you found this thread.
My late friend John had two 'ball and cage' lamps, each slightly different. One was a bit smaller and the ball was a dark teak color.
He also had your beautiful "spiral" design lamp, as well. It started at the top right under the socket close to the central shaft and got progrssively larger until it reached the wider bottom. It was just as impressive as the "ball and cage".
I really wish someone would put 'em back into production, because there's not too many well designed American made table lamps these days and these would surely be quite popular.
Can you tell us how long they were in production? For the era, I'd venture that they were fairly expensive.
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