Small Home Gazette, Winter 2019
Vintage Lighting Sales, Repairs and Restoration
This illustration from a 1920s home furnishings book shows fashionable lamps and lampshades. Depending on your tolerance level for fringe and beads, a single shade of this style will evoke a wonderfully retro mood in your living room or den.
Now that John’s shop is gone, where do you go for vintage lighting sales, repair and restoration? Fortunately, there are still (and long have been) numerous businesses in the area offering similar services. Here are a few of our favorites.
Let There Be Light Antiques
220-2 Commercial St., Stillwater
612-351-7580
This well-known shop downsized in 2019. It is now located in a garage-like building, a half-block off Stillwater’s main street. Look for a small sign taped to a large garage door.
The owner repairs and restores customers’ fixtures and also sells lampshades. Work is done by appointment only so schedule an appointment by calling or emailing steve@belightmn.com. Note that shop owner, Steve Gnan, typically does most of his work during our warm weather season.
Lightworks
1325 Winter St. N.E., Annex Building, Minneapolis
612-724-8311
lightworkslighting.com
Lightworks has specialized in Arts & Crafts/Mission light fixtures throughout the 21 years it has been in business. What sets them apart is that in addition to repairing, restoring and selling vintage pieces, they also build custom light fixtures to order. What’s more, they are the only lighting shop in the area that is certified to label their fixtures as UL Listed.
Though they are branching out into building modern fixtures at the request of local architects and designers, their Arts & Crafts business has never lagged.
“We think the style is timeless,” says Kathryn Daily, who co-owns Lightworks with her husband, Charles. “People are putting Mission fixtures into more modern settings because the angular lines work with contemporary architecture.”
Note that their business, previously located in Minneapolis’s warehouse district, moved to Northeast Minneapolis in 2018.
Northwest Architectural Salvage
981 Selby Ave., St. Paul
612-644-9270
tinyurl.com/y9qdcthn
Northwest Architectural Salvage is housed in a sturdy early 20th century brick retail building. Though they have a wide range of architectural house parts and hardware, they also boast a healthy collection of vintage light fixtures and lamps, many from the bungalow era. And unlike most local salvage businesses, they will repair, restore and rewire fixtures you bring to them.
The Lamp Mender
9911 Lyndale Ave. S., Bloomington
952-881-2636
lampmender.com
Located in a nondescript strip mall in Bloomington, this full-service lighting shop has been around since 1984. It was previously located in the Antiques Minnesota mall on Lake Street in Minneapolis for many years.
The Lamp Mender offers expert light fixture repair and refurbishing. They also sell vintage lamps, wall sconces, and ceiling fixtures, and have a deep selection of lampshades, finials, and lamp parts.
Eastwood Gallery
1818 Selby Ave., St. Paul
651-695-1902
mission2modern.com
Though Eastwood Gallery doesn’t offer light fixture repair or restoration services, they do sell some beautiful and unusual Arts & Crafts lighting. At the time of this writing, they had an oak Gustav Stickley table lamp, for example, and many more interesting ceiling fixtures and table and floor lamps. And, of course, Eastwood Gallery is always filled with choice pieces of Arts & Crafts furniture, pottery, metalwork, textiles and paintings.
Make Your Own Lampshade
Looking for a craft project to help fill the long winter evenings? How about making your very own lampshade with parchment or linen, and paint and crepe paper? Download a PDF copy of an article on lampshade making from a 1929 publication titled Arts and Crafts for Home Decoration.
