The Lamp

My husband has an interesting sense of style. Most of the time we agree on things, but there are a couple of notable exceptions. His lamp is one of those. His brother is a priest and my husband visited him while he was at the seminary in Indiana. The seminary has what my husband describes at catacombs under the school and when students finish their time there, they leave furniture, lamps, etc. in the catacombs for new students to use in their rooms. That is where he found the Lamp.

It is comprised of two pieces that almost certainly didn’t start life together because they don’t really go together, but my husband LOVES the lamp. The deal we made when we got married was that the lamp couldn’t be in any of the public areas of the house lest someone mistakenly assume that I had something/anything to do with this atrocity. So it has mostly lived in a closet, and for a long time was in his office at work and that drew a number of interesting/quizzical comments/looks.

Over time, the lamp (which was OLD when he retrieved it from the catacombs) deteriorated to the point where the lining and rings at the top and bottom of the shade had come out. The fabric of the shade was ugly, but still in good shape. So for his Christmas present this year, I found a company that refurbishes lamp shades and makes custom lamp shades. My husband reinforced a box with wood and shipped his treasure to Jack of All Shades in Albertville, AL.

I’m telling you that the work that they did was nothing short of miraculous. They relined the shade and reattached the rings and clearly gave it a good cleaning. The end result is a shade that may outlive us (unfortunately). My husband is using the Lamp as his design inspiration for his office which is part of our basement renovation. It will be interesting, but it’s his office, so I don’t care.

Here it is in all its glory:

He is so happy to have it back home safely.