Every hole you punch lands somewhere.
Tap the shade to punch a hole. Drag it sideways to turn it; pull the cord, or use Higher and Lower, to move it.Drag it sideways to turn it; use Higher and Lower to move it.
Pendants, wall and floor lamps from small makers, and our own spun and punched shades, made in the workshop behind the shop in Kent Town. We draw lighting plans for homes, too.
Up and down arrows raise and lower the shade, left and right turn it. P punches a hole where the ring shows on the wall. 1 to 4 choose a pattern, plus and minus make it bolder or finer, and Backspace clears your own holes.
Your shade, laid flat.
This is the drawing we punch from: the disc before it’s spun, with your holes where the punch will go. Choose how much light gets through, the size and the finish, and tap the drawing to add holes of your own.
Tap the drawing, or press P while it has focus, to punch a hole of your own into it.
Up to four letters or figures, punched larger into the side that faces the wall.
Ask us for a guide price.
Ask us to punch it
Spun, then punched, out the back.
Through the door at the back of the shop there’s a spinning lathe, a long bench and racks of shades waiting for their holes. Here’s yours being made, in the pattern and metal you chose.
Over the form.
Every shade starts as a flat disc of steel or brass. We spin it on the lathe over a turned timber form, pressing it down a little at a time with a long tool, from the middle out, until the disc is the dome you picked.
Set out from the crown.
We mark the pattern out from the crown with a flexible rule and a dividing plate: a ring every 20 millimetres down the side and twenty-four divisions round it. Your holes are laid on those lines.
Bigger toward the rim.
Then it’s punched by hand on an end-grain block, a few hundred hits, one at a time. The holes grow toward the rim, because light leaving from there has further to go before it lands.
Waxed, blackened or bright.
Last comes the finish: raw steel waxed so it keeps its spinning marks, steel blackened to a soft dark sheen, or spun brass left bright. Each shade goes out with its cloth cord and ceiling cup; your electrician hangs and connects it.
Raw steel, blackened and spun brass: three finishes, three patterns, all from the one form. The lights on the shop wall come from their makers’ own benches; the spun ones come from here.
Lights from small makers.
Opal globe
Blown glass that lights the whole table and the faces round it.
Linen drum
Pleated linen; soft light out the sides, a pool below.
Cane pendant
Woven cane that throws a loose lattice on the ceiling.
Ceramic bell
Glazed clay, all the light down onto the bench.
Folded brass wall light
Washes up and down the wall at once.
Turned timber floor lamp
Light where you sit, and you can move it.
We change the wall every few weeks. Come in and switch things on.
Before anyone chases a wall.
Send us floor plans or photos, or we’ll come and walk through. We draw a lighting plan for the house: where each light goes, what it is, and which ones go on a dimmer. We draw the plan; your electrician installs it.
How bright, how warm.
Brightness is lumens: how much light a lamp gives out altogether. A reading lamp needs a few hundred; a kitchen bench wants more, spread wide and even. Warmth is colour temperature, in kelvin, and it runs the wrong way round: the lower the number, the warmer the light. Around 2700 is a lamp’s glow at night; 4000 is a clear afternoon, and it’s what we try shades under in the dark room, so the pattern shows crisp.
Hang it lower than you think.
Over a table, most shades look right with the rim about an arm’s length above the top. Go for a shade about half the table’s width, or two smaller ones over a long table, and put anything you eat under on a dimmer. We’ll punch initials or a date into a shade, too, and after dark they show on the ceiling. Try yours
Come and stand under them.
We’re in Kent Town: the showroom at the front, the workshop through the door at the back. Bring a photo of the room, or its plan, and we’ll switch a few things on for you. We’re open late on Thursdays so you can see them the way they’ll look at home.