How Chandelier Parts Came To Be
If you have gone to Grandma and Grandpa’s house for a visit, chances are you would have gaped in awe at the elegant antique chandeliers hanging from their ceilings. While awe-struck, you would also muse about the possibility of any of those glass or crystal ornaments falling off and breaking on the floor. Check out black chandeliers.
Irony of ironies, Medieval age citizens did not even harbor such concerns about their chandeliers, considering the fact that what they considered elegant lighting fixture then consisted of crudely constructed wooden crosses and wagon wheels that hold candles that were fixed in place by spikes. They then simply pull the entire chandelier up to the ceiling with a rope or pulley. Its main function is the provision of light. Chandeliers as a decorative piece were never a consideration for nobles and monks, who installed these lights in their castles and abbeys.
It was during the 15th century that chandelier artisans thought about creating parts that would make the lighting fixture resemble the circlets, tiaras and crowns that encircled the brows of European royalty. Using the tiaras, crowns and circlets as models, as well as studying the interiors of the various residences of the nobility, they began developing parts that are more elaborate and intricate in design. It certainly is no surprise, therefore, that chandeliers became the status symbols of the rich and famous.
It was during the 18th and 19th centuries that artisans’ experimentation on chandelier parts extended toward the use of other types of materials. Instead of the gold and silver, they began to use brass extensively, creating chandeliers with many tiers and branches that can support hundreds of candles. Glass artisans, not wanting to be outshined by their fellow craftsmen, began developing glass pieces that do not only serve as décor, but also have greater refractivity so that a more intense light can be produced. As gas and, consequently, electricity use became widespread at the close of the 19th century, craftsmen and manufacturers made improvements in chandeliers to accommodate these new power sources.
At the start of the 20th century and beyond, chandelier parts have achieved a high level of creativity and complexity in style and design. Whereas before you only have the traditional crystal and glass drops and spears, you now have prisms coming in the shapes of almonds, octagons and pendalogues. The filthy rich also don’t have to limit themselves to garish glass or crystal ornaments on their chandeliers. They now also purchase chandeliers with rocks hued into beads, balls and bears, or they would buy fixtures with the gorgeous Strass crystals of the Swarovski Company. Even chandelier adornments are not just the dangling types, so that now you have ivory and alabaster covers, torchiere and other styles of lamps shades, lead, brass and silver bobeches and canopies, fan leaves, lamp harps, collar hoops, coil hooks, and various styles of candelabra bulbs. Even the chandelier is not just a long column; it has intricate designs along its length, with the column itself being translucent or with pressed breaks, having long, curving arms of chrome extending from it.
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