Period Style Ceiling Light Fixtures

Posted by Ardie Haug on Jul 28, 2016

When it comes to choosing lighting fixtures, there are many styles from which to choose. In general, you will want to choose a style that complements the architectural style of your home. However, you may want to go with something different for a specific room.

Tiffany Style Ceiling Light Fixtures

Louis Comfort Tiffany first began selling his stained glass lamps in 1899. Technically, they belong to the Art Nouveau period, but they deserve their own category, as they are so distinctive, colorful, and beautiful. Original Tiffany lamps are more than expensive, selling for as much as a million dollars. However, there are plenty of beautiful reproductions created in the Tiffany style.

Many Tiffany style ceiling lights are pendants and inverted pendants. However, within that one type of fixture, there is a wonderful variety of design. There are also chandeliers, semi-flushmounts, and stained glass flushmounts. A Tiffany style lamp is a unique and a gorgeous addition to accent your ceiling fixture.

Victorian Style Ceiling Light Fixtures

It was only in the later part of the Victorian period that electricity began to power lights. So, Victorian style lighting is based on old gas fixtures. The housings are usually etched or opaque glass globes that face upwards (so that the smoke from the gas could escape). The arms on Victorian light fixtures were designed to carry gas to the flame--so they are thicker than in other period styles. As with everything in the Victorian period, lighting fixtures used very ornate metalwork. They are sometimes oversized. Check the size of a fixture before ordering (especially if you are ordering a chandelier).

Victorian style chandeliers, pendants, semi-flushmount and flushmount fixtures are all available. Add a Victorian Floor Lamp as an accent.

Arts & Crafts Ceiling Light Fixtures

The Arts and Crafts movement began around the turn of the 20th century as a reaction to the heavily ornamented Victorian style. It favors simple straight lines and the use of natural materials, such as copper, wood, and mica. It emphasizes the importance of handmade crafts, as opposed to factory-produced items.

Different types of ceiling fixtures can be found in the Arts and Crafts style, including pendants, chandeliers, and semi-flushmounts fixtures.

Art Deco Ceiling Light Fixtures

Although the period of Art Deco had its heyday from 1925-1950, it wasn't called Art Deco until the 1960s. Art Deco style is abstract, urban, and jazzy. It emphasizes soft, curving porcelain or glass housings--sometimes with contrasting patterned metalwork. It embraced the industrial twentieth century by using new materials like aluminum and bakelite and was the first style to incorporate electricity from the beginning.

You may also want to try looking for Art Deco ceiling light fixtures in pendants, chandeliers, flushmount and sem-flushmount fixtures.

Mission Style Ceiling Light Fixtures

Mission style refers to lighting that is boxy and warm. It is related to the Arts and Crafts style in that it tends to favor simple, plain lines. However, it tends towards darker and warmer coloring based on desert colors. Some Mission pieces tend towards a softer, more feminine look with rounder glass housings. This softer look provides an alternative to the stark, strong traditional Mission formality.

Mission style lighting fixtures come in a great variety, including flushmount fixtures, pendants, island lights, and chandeliers.

Tudor Style Light Fixtures

What we call Tudor style is really an interpretation of Tudor architecture that became very popular in the 1920s. It romanticized rustic English cottages, and is characterized by steeply pitched roofs, dark vertical wood stripping against white walls, and mullioned windows.

Tudor lighting uses flat, sometimes colored glass in heavy metal settings, garnished with chains, to invoke a medieval flavor.