midcentury-modern pendant lamps & fiberglass lampshades

Moss Lamp with shade

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by

meteor

vintage Moss Lamp with reproduction shade

Vintage Moss Lamp (Lucite base) from the 1950s with new vintage-style lampshade.
main tier: white
top + bottom tiers: aqua
pattern: black arcs

The Moss Lamps factory wasn’t far from where our workshop is in San Francisco. Moss Lamps ceased manufacturing their distinctive lamps in the 1960s, but they stayed open as a retail lamp shop on a ragged Mission St block in SOMA until the late 1990s. There is an interesting and informative book available on Moss Lamps by Donald-Brian Johnson. Whoever borrowed our shop copy — we want it back!

We have many years experience in acrylic fabrication, and have done our share of repairs on the fragile Moss Lucite lamps (Lucite and Plexiglas are tradenames for acrylic), but we no longer have the time to do these repairs.

Comments

3 responses to “Moss Lamp with shade”

  1. mel

    Hey thanks a lot for the info, I will do as you suggested. I’m looking at putting one of your cool shades on this lamp or another that I’m putting together so you havn’t seen the last of me. Thanks again, mel

    Reply
  2. meteor

    Hi Mel- This is a “Moss lamp” that was made by the now-defunct Moss Lighting Co. near the corner of 6th and Mission (about a mile from our workshop in the Mission District) in downtown San Francisco in the 1950s. A comprehensive book on Moss Lamps that was published in the late 1990s which had a price guide. I can’t find our copy right now, and the prices would certainly be different anyways. I don’t know if the book is still in print, but it shouldn’t be too hard to find. As a rough estimate, I would say $400-$600 for the floor version of the lamp, but I could be way off in either direction.

    The lamp is a customer’s lamp for which we made a replacement shade. The original shades were these weird things made of loose mat fiberglass. The design of the original shades didn’t provide much ventilation, and the fiberglass was bound with starch, instead of resin. As a result, it’s very hard to find the original shades in decent condition.

    As you can see in the photo, our shades are very compatible with the Moss lamps.

    Instead of turning the lamp over to UPS, you could make a claim for a repair amount. Depending on the damage, an acrylic fabricator might be able to repair it. The acrylic (aka Plexiglas, Lucite, etc.) in the lamp base is still available.

    Best Wishes

    Reply
  3. mel

    Hi ,
    Im not sure what this site is but I have an earlier version of this lamp that was broken in shipment and am trying to establish a value for UPS or find some one to fix it. My version is black and white base / w a tan fiberglass shade FLOOR LAMP I really like this piece and dont want to give it to UPS for inspection because I’ll probably never see it again. Are you selling this item or ??/ The shade is awesome. Thanks Mel

    Reply

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