Ugly No More - Family Heirloom Restoration Project is Complete

The lamp formerly known as the Ugly Lamp is complete and has a new home on a corner table in our lakeside cabin.  It seems happy there.  Since the last time I blogged about the lamp, I purchased the white shade, and after debating whether to paint the shade, I finally glued beaded trim and polka dot ribbon on the bottom edge, and a narrow ribbon near the top edge.  I'm happy with the result.  Meanwhile, my sweet husband wired the lamp so that it would actually work.  This is it, below, just after we turned it on for the very first time after being wired.  It hasn't been illuminated in decades.

When I first began the restoration process, more than two years ago, the lamp looked like the left-hand pic below.  On the right, you see it with some of the layers of paint removed.  I blogged about the history of this family heirloom, carved by my grandfather, and how it came into my possession, in the blog post you will find by clicking here.  You can also see more photos of the restoration process there.

After working on the lamp, I've decided the lamp was probably a gift from my grandfather to my grandmother when they got married.  The carving isn't as sophisticated as much of his later work, and it has engraved, on the three sides of the base, the following: a Jewish star; a menorah; and an entwined 'H' and 'R', the initials of my grandparents, Harry and Rae.  There is no such personal symbolism on any of his other pieces that I know of.   You can see the entwined initials in the images below, which show the lamp turned off and illuminated. 

 For more information about my grandfather and his wood carving / sculpture, including the story of the missing totem pole, check out the following links on my blog:
 
My grandfather's carvings, part 1

My grandfather's carvings, part 2

The Ugly Lamp - restoring a family heirloom part 2

More than two years ago I acquired a family heirloom known as the Ugly Lamp, and got the go-ahead from my family to repaint it however I desired, since NOBODY wanted the lamp.  I shared pics of it "as is", and told you all about the lamp and why/how I acquired it in a blog post, HERE.  As of today, after some minor touch-ups, the painting of the lamp is complete, and I want to share it with you.  I'm calling the color scheme "demented circus" though the original inspiration was designer McKenzie Childs.

I should explain, the lamp was carved by my woodcarver/furniture maker/sculptor grandfather Harry Levine, who I unfortunately never got to meet. Most of his carving work is much more sophisticated than this, and I'm hypothesizing, because of the intertwined initials and the crudeness of the sculpture, that perhaps he made the work early in his career, as a wedding gift for my grandmother. 

At the time of the original blog post, I had been cleaning the lamp in preparation for repainting.  I spent many hours washing and stripping it, first chemically, and when that became unsuccessful, using a delicate grinding tool to get rid of the old paint.  Finally, when I discovered a layer of what is called 'milk paint', I gave into my frustration and aborted the attempt to strip the paint.  I sprayed it with a coat of primer, took some photos of it, and used colored pencils on the photos to pick out a color scheme.  The pics above are the lamp when it first came into my possession, and after I started removing some of the paint.

I started painting the lamp, but I wasn't satisfied with the colors. I purchased more paint, and changed the colors several times.  Finally I gave up.  Almost two years passed and this August I decided it was time to get back to the project, and approached it with a fresh perspective.  And now I'm sharing with you the finished product!  The lamp is 3-sided, with a different engraving on the base of each side: a menorah (the top photo), my grandparents' intertwined initials (H for Harry, R for Rae; directly above), and on the third side, a Star of David (Jewish star) (pictured below). 

I don't know that my grandfather, Harry Levine, would have liked it, since his work was very traditional, but I think that my family is pleased with my renovation, and I'm pretty satisfied with it!  Here's the top, pictured below, not that it will be visible once it has a shade on it.

Now I've got two more decisions to make: first, I need to choose what to use for a final protective coat.  I'm torn between keeping the satin finish of the paint or possibly adding a hard gloss shine.  The second decision is the shade.  (My husband is going to rewire it while I figure this out.)  I've received suggestions to use a colored shade, such as green or yellow, but I prefer white because of the light quality.  I'm considering possibly painting some simple large spots of color on the white shade, using the same colors, or perhaps mimicking the shapes of the leaves with a line pattern or even a printed pattern.  So I will print a few photos of the base, and get out the colored pencils again, coloring my various options for lampshades.  I'll let you know what I decide and how it turns out!  (I may even turn to you for your opinions, not that I'll listen!)  Then the only other decision will be to figure out where to put the lamp, since it is rather substantial in size.  I may need to buy a table for it....

The Ugly Lamp - restoring a family heirloom, part 1

My grandfather, Harry Levine,was a Jewish Russian-born immigrant.  In his hometown of Vilna (then Russia, now Lithuania), he was trained as a woodcarver/furniture maker.  He came to NYC in his late teens, somewhere around 1912, plus or minus a couple of years.  (I've not yet been able to find him or my grandmother on any ship manifesto.)  In NYC, my grandfather studied at the Educational Arts Alliance, where his woodcarving skills became transformed into the talent of a sculptor.  I'm very proud that the wonderful Brooklyn Museum owns two pieces of his work.  They can be seen on permanent display in the Luce Center for Visible Storage in the museum.  I've written about him several times before on the blog, in particular here and here. 

Sadly, my grandfather died young, and my brothers and I never met him.  The legacy he left behind includes etchings, watercolors, carved busts, an intricately carved fiddle, and many wonderful pieces of furniture.  We each have pieces. For example, I have a beautiful hutch-cabinet, and a library-size table that I use as my dining room table, with carved lion heads on the ends.  One brother has the violin, another has a bust and an end table, and so on.  And then, there's the piece that nobody wanted, the ugly lamp...

The lamp has been the family joke for years.  We have no idea who spray-painted it gold, but it didn't help make it look better.  When our parents had both passed away, and we sorted out the remnants of their home, it was the one thing that nobody claimed.  One brother finally agreed to take it, and the lamp has been stored in his basement collecting dust for many years now. 

He and his wife recently bought a retirement home in Cape Cod, and have been cleaning out their former home and getting rid of stuff.  Periodically, a package will arrive in the mail.  Recently, the package included a lovely needlepoint that my mom had made.  It was rolled up, smelled like wood smoke, and was dirty.  I had it dry-cleaned, matted, and framed with glass, and this weekend we hung it on the wall at our Loon Lake cottage.  I remember my mom making this, and I know she'd be glad to know I have it safely now. 

Also in the package was... yup, you guessed it; the ugly lamp.  I agreed to take the lamp with the agreement that nobody would get upset with me for giving it some sort of funky renovation.  My plan is to make it whimsical and multicolored, possibly with colors like turquoise, yellow, and magenta, though that is just my current idea; I could change my mind tomorrow.  But I will not change what my grandfather carved.  In the base of the lamp there are three panels with engraved insignia.  The first panel has an intertwined H and an R, my grandmother Rae and grandfather Harry's first initials.

 The other panels have a Star of David (often called a Jewish Star) and a menorah.  Compared to my grandfather's usual intricate, detailed, sculptural carving, these crude engravings are rather odd.

The lamp, when I received it, was filthy from years of living in storage.    So I figured I'd start by scrubbing it off with some soapy water and a stiff brush.  And suddenly, I discovered there was other paint under the gold. 

 The more I scrubbed, and rinsed, the more of the gold paint came off, and the more red and black I discovered.  I think the red was painted over the black, though I'm not sure.

And then, as I continued scrubbing, the red and black paint (and some white that I presume is a primer) all started to come off too, exposing the bare wood underneath. 

 When I finally stopped scrubbing and rinsing today, this is how the lamp looked. 

 The paint almost completely came off the top of the  lamp, but not around the curves. 

Now that it's drying out, I'm trying to decide how to next proceed.  Can I just spray a coat of primer on the whole thing once it is dry?  Or now that so much paint  has come off, do I have to get off every stitch of the paint, that I wasn't originally planning to remove at all?  (I absolutely HATE doing paint removal.)  I have no idea what kind of paint is on the lamp.  If you, my readers, have done any  similar renovation/restoration projects, I'd love your advice on techniques and materials.  In the meantime, this is how the lamp looks as it is drying out. I'll be posting 'part 2' when the project is complete!