Ceramic Table Lamp By Denis Castaing

Beaux Arts furniture included chairs replicating models from the Renaissance and sofas inspired by Louis XIV. These pieces filled high-ceilinged rooms that featured tapestries fit for a medieval castle and were illuminated by crystal chandeliers reminiscent of those in European palaces. Leon Marcotte Company created furnishings for the White House mimicking the style of Louis XVI, while in France, cabinetmaker Louis Majorelle reproduced 18th-century pieces that would influence his later Art Nouveau style.

Students at the École des Beaux-Arts in 19th-century Paris meticulously sketched Roman and Greek art and architecture as part of a curriculum that elevated the classical world. This reverence for history informed the architecture and design being constructed in the French capital and beyond, where columns and pediments were joined with elements referencing the Renaissance and Baroque eras, culminating in grand civic buildings such as the Palais Garnier opera house constructed under Napoleon III.

Beaux Arts style, also known as Classical Eclecticism for its flamboyant mixing of influences, made its way to the United States in the late 19th century through American architects who studied in Paris, like Richard Morris Hunt and Charles Follen McKim. They designed monumental turn-of-the-century buildings like train stations, libraries, museums and mansions that featured soaring entry halls and grand stairways with nearly every surface embellished, from mosaic floors to stained-glass ceilings. The luxurious interiors of these Beaux Arts buildings, which weren’t crowded with objects as in the Victorian era, matched this spirit of opulence and embraced the past.

Find a collection of Beaux Arts decorative objects, lighting, wall decorations and other furniture on 1stDibs.

Well-crafted antique and vintage table lamps do more than provide light; the right fixture-and-table combination can add a focal point or creative element to any interior.

Proper table lamps have long been used for lighting our most intimate spaces. Perfect for lighting your nightstand or reading nook, table lamps play an integral role in styling an inviting room. In the years before electricity, lamps used oil. Today, a rewired 19th-century vintage lamp can still provide a touch of elegance for a study.

After industrial milestones such as mass production took hold in the Victorian era, various design movements sought to bring craftsmanship and innovation back to this indispensable household item. Lighting designers affiliated with Art Deco, which originated in the glamorous roaring ’20s, sought to celebrate modern life by fusing modern metals with dark woods and dazzling colors in the fixtures of the era. The geometric shapes and gilded details of vintage Art Deco table lamps provide an air of luxury and sophistication that never goes out of style.

After launching in 1934, Anglepoise lamps soon became a favorite among modernist architects and designers, who interpreted the fixture as “a machine for lighting,” just as Le Corbusier had reimagined the house as “a machine for living in.” The popular task light owed to a collaboration between a vehicle-suspension engineer by the name of George Carwardine and a West Midlands springs manufacturer, Herbert Terry & Sons. 

Some mid-century modern table lamps, particularly those created by the likes of Joe Colombo and the legendary lighting artisans at Fontana Arte, bear all the provocative hallmarks associated with Space Age design. Sculptural and versatile, the Louis Poulsen table lamps of that period were revolutionary for their time and still seem innovative today. 

If you are looking for something more contemporary, industrial table lamps are demonstrative of a newly chic style that isn’t afraid to pay homage to the past. They look particularly at home in any rustic loft space amid exposed brick and steel beams.

Before you buy a desk lamp or table lamp for your living room, consider your lighting needs. The Snoopy lamp, designed in 1967, or any other “banker’s lamp” (shorthand for the Emeralite desk lamps patented by H.G. McFaddin and Company), provides light at a downward angle that is perfect for writing, while the Fontana table lamp and the beloved Grasshopper lamp by Greta Magnusson-Grossman each yield a soft and even glow. Some table lamps require lampshades to be bought separately.

Whether it’s a classic antique Tiffany table lamp, a Murano glass table lamp or even a bold avant-garde fixture custom-made by a contemporary design firm, the right table lamp can completely transform a room. Find the right one for you on 1stDibs.