Friday Finds - 1970's Floor Lamp!

Today I want to show off two vintage lamps found a few weeks apart from the same source down by the Maryland Shore.  And I want to pat myself on the back for spotting them and jumping on the opportunity.  I love them so much, the structural, architectural quality is very striking to me. 

I realized they would need to be rewired and refinished completely.  Luckily my dad was just as excited about the find and has been leading the charge on cleaning them up.  

The first lamp is an over sized (taller than me) angle-poise style, this a gold finish, which Toby is helping to model.  It is missing a base and has lots of rust spots.  Both lamps had been stored outside so this is not unexpected.  The anglepoise won't be finished until after it is moved to the UK and rewired correctly.  I'd love to finish it in a copper like this...

but in my experience I struggle to achieve the finish I want with metallic spray paints, so I will probably go with a glossy black instead.  
Speaking of a glossy black finish, meet our second vintage lamp, the club lamp,from the 1970's (we think).  It has four arcing lamp arms and a dimmer switch, plus a very heavy base, shaped to fit under a sofa.  

The club lamp was in pretty poor condition, with a lot of rust spots and I disliked the original color (mottled gold, black, and red) so we choose to strip it and refinish.  Some people may see it as sacrilege to have stripped the original finish but it's done now so please keep that to yourself.  When you find your own vintage lamp you can do what you like with it.  Besides in this case it was gross and not for resale, so its only value to me was in how it could fit into our new contemporary space.  

Dad used a mix of chemical paint stripper and sandpaper.  He protected the white enameled surface inside of the shades with tape.  From there it was just about finding the right color with spray paint.  We used a primer to prep the lamp for paint.    

My first instinct was to try a pop of mint green, but unfortunately we hated how it came out.  I think the club lamp looks much more classic in black and it looks great at its new home in Ocean City, MD.  

The perfect reading corner!  Best part is the cost, both lamps came from the same salvage place down on the Easternshore and were less than $50 together.    
 Plus we found it very cool to breath new life into a vintage piece like this.

-Nikki