Brass is one of the more common materials for your old home’s furnishings and hardware to be made of. Back in the day (when your grand dad was but a twinkle in his pop’s eye), it was the cheapest, most readily available and most suitable metal for creating these pieces. Coincidentally, it also looks lovely when it is aged! Shiny new brass can look a little bit like it came from a thrift store, or was just the cheap option when you went to the furniture store to replace your door handles, your knockers or your latches. The other thing about getting brass objects which are new and shiny is that...

You will all be starting to think that we have misspelt our company name on the site, and that it is really Artchitectural Classics – or perhaps that we are on the payroll of the UK Centre for the Arts – with yet another post on architecture-related art. Luminox in Oxford a couple of months ago is the subject. Like the Salt Mines in Poland, or the Ice hotel in Sweden complete with chandeliers, this post makes you wish you had been there… It was the creation of a French artist, Carabosse, and basically involved turning off all electric light to Oxford Square from around 7pm, and lighting...

At least part of the reason that you can find so many beautiful, ornate, handmade and gorgeous decorative lamps, lights and fixtures is the symbolism of light to cultures all over the world. Light is one of those wonderful nouns with a meaning well beyond it’s dictionary meaning – and rare among these words and concepts in that the feelings it conjures for people cross many cultural boundaries. It is a scientific phenomena that creates all sorts of feelings for us, from sleepiness, to comfort, to romanticism, to an occasional terror in its absence. Lights are made from fire, one of the basic...

People have long been able and willing to justify the effort and time taken to create many amazing things in the name of religion and honoring higher powers. This faith and the things it can create are seen in the oddest of spots, including this salt mine in Poland, which houses a chapel with chandeliers that have crystals made of salt! They are a lot more durable than the ice chandelier that we saw in Sweden, and also throw a strange dusky night time light. In the eighteenth century, lead-cut crystal became much more common with the advent of new technologies, and people also found that it made...

If you have, or have found a lamp with a gorgeous base, but a rotting or just plain bad-taste shade, you can re-cover the shade quite easily. We know that those of you reading this blog are antique nuts (it takes one to know one!), and if, like us, you are a perfectionist when it comes to your antiques and furniture, this easy technique should come in handy! You can also match or coordinate your lamp shade with your other upholstery – curtains, tablecloths, cushions, etc with this guide. You’ll need a fabric pencil, paper backed fusible webbing (iron-on backing) and fabric, all available from...

The materials that we here at Architectural Classics get all gooey inside over are the brasses, coppers, and great quality woods made centuries ago. They are from a time where it took twice as many people, much more specialized knowledge, mistake-honed skill and absolutely no machines to make anything! Today, the skill in making the same sort of furnishings for home is in being able to manipulate technology to do amazing and imaginative things – rather than manipulating your own hands to do so. The skill is now in the design rather than the manufacture – so I wonder if Architectural Classics,...

We’re talking about the big shift, from the general use of incandescent globes to energy saving globes, which use only 25% as much energy as their old style cousins, and save us enormous amounts of both money and greenhouse gases over their lifetime. Who knew that a light bulb could create such an involved conversation (except maybe Thomas Edison!). But there is a lot of talk being thrown around currently about how great energy saving bulbs are. Truth is, that they are going to be an absolutely necessary weapon in our arsenal against climate change – but there are two sides to every story....

Lyman (usually just ‘L.’) Frank Baum wrote The Wizard of Oz, one of my personal all-time favourite movies and one to which I know all of the lyrics, including whether the high voiced Munchkins or low-voiced Munchkins sing the lines! It is an absolute classic, as well as the first movie to be made in color, and the classical style of the movie is reflected in the design of this chandelier in the lobby of the Hotel del Coronado, which Mr. Baum also designed. With a total of 25 lamps to make the crystal chains underneath absolutely glow, and elegant styling which is all the more beautiful for...

The Ice Hotel is located in Jukkasjärvi in Sweden – a shivering 200 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle! All of the ice in the hotel, including the gorgeous clear columns, the intricate chandelier, and the impressive walls comes from the River Torne. This river apparently produces the clearest ice possible, because of the water’s purity and the steady movement of the river. It has an eerie, solemn, alien look to most of it, and the ice chandelier that you see at the start of the movie is one of the touches that makes it seem a bit more accessible and human. You could otherwise believe...

Well, the urban legend of the nail sticking up out of the floor holding up a chandelier in a room below (or you can substitute wires) may just have some truth about it – but by gosh, it sure isn’t scary! Unlike the one about the murderer in the back seat of the car, or the tapping at the window, this one is just a little bit pointless. The (scary) story goes, that there were a pair of sisters who were never allowed to touch a nail sticking out of their parents’ bedroom floor, but were not told why. One morning they came in to their parents’ bedroom to find them dead mysteriously, and the...