Vintage 5-Light Deco Chandelier With Czech Shades

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Description

If you’re looking for bling you’ve come to the right place! This American lighting fixture from around the 30s-40s era … Read more If you’re looking for bling you’ve come to the right place! This American lighting fixture from around the 30s-40s era will wow you and anyone else lucky enough to see it.

The metal fixture itself has been rewired from the canopy to the main cluster; all the other wiring (original) is in excellent condition. There’s a four-way switch which operates with the turn of the finial on the bottom. If you want just two of the bulbs lit, no problem. Or just three… or all five, or all off. The switch works fine, but I’d caution you that it’s in the vicinity of a hundred years old and if it were mine, let’s just say I wouldn’t be using it except on a casual basis (to show it off!). Your wall switch will light the fixture just fine – leave the switch on the all five shades setting. Of course you can employ a dimmer on your wall switch if so desired, and depending on what bulbs you use. The shades are just large enough to obscure a “normal” sized bulb. I would recommend five 60-watt bulbs, but the wiring can easily handle higher wattages. Should the switch eventually fail (sometime in the next hundred years) it’s very easily bypassed (it’s a five-minute job).

Some “Sunday decorator” decided to spray-paint the metal and didn’t do that great a job. I’ve touched up a variety of chips to the paint with an extremely well-matching paint. That would-be decorator or some other suspect drilled two holes in the canopy so it could be fastened to the ceiling more easily than by going to the hardware store to get the proper mounting devices (which I’ve now installed). Oh well.

The last photo of the canopy and chain shows that I’ve touched up the chain and canopy both with the paint I mentioned (the other photos are “before restoration”).

The shades are Czechoslovakian and in the “good as it gets” territory and, if I’m not mistaken, have an opalescent interior (which lends itself to creating a warm and attractive light). There’s a multitude of subtle colors in the glass and that flower-strewn, black background border at the top shows nothing less than design genius. The shades are in excellent condition. These shades were intended to screw onto a light socket or some other device. In this situation they merely sit on the end of each arm and gravity keeps them there. Gravity, that is, and the bulb, should the chandelier be jostled by Fifi the maid as she feather-dusts. The original shades probably had a collar which descended into the area where the socket resides. When you change bulbs you just have to hold each shade as you remove its bulb, one at a time.

The fixture descends about 24 inches from the ceiling and has a diameter of 16 ½ inches. Chain links can easily be removed or added.

The shades will be double-boxed when shipped. See less