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Vintage Industrial Lighting
Vintage lighting runs through our veins – for us, it’s where it all began.
Lighting with history
Trainspotters headed up the new vintage aesthetic of the early 2000s, bringing salvaged industrial to the mainstream with carefully sourced and expertly restored items at fair prices. Our expertise in finding large quantities of vintage industrial items meant the market was no longer niched to trade experts and antiques dealers, but available to anyone with an eye for the trend.
Popular culture influences
Pre-noughties lighting was in a nutshell, completely uninspiring! Buying ‘vintage’ lights meant lumping for poor quality cost-driven reproductions or out-dated Victoriana. The Cheers bar had lost its appeal and instead the red stone New York loft apartments of Friends and Sex In The City were the new go-to looks.
It was an exciting era and no location was out of bounds – vintage industrial lighting came from factories, churches and chapels, institutions, asylums and municipal streetscapes – all abandoned in favour of regeneration; yet all the time it was clear this was not a fly by night trend, each piece breathed integrity and they were exactly what people had been longing for.
A learning curve
The restoration process is a labour of love. Sourcing and buying (or as it’s otherwise referred to ‘reclaiming’) vintage lights is a skill but the refurbishment process to bring items back to their former glory is quite another story. It has taken years of trial and error to finely hone the talents that will ensure a vintage light looks both amazing and is inherently safe for the current market.
Lighting for life
Many resources are committed to perfecting the necessary techniques to provide top end vintage industrial lights. Sometimes there is an extra buzz of doing this for a rare or possible one-off item which is good enough to be lovingly restored and passed on to a new generation.
And so, the love affair with vintage industrial lighting continues.
A significant part of Trainspotters’ business is vintage lighting, whether we’re salvaging, buying, restoring or selling, it’s how it all started and it continues to drive us forward. We are very lucky to have a skilful and knowledgeable (small) team who are happy and enthusiastic about spending the majority of their time here at New …
Vintage is our area of expertise but historians we are not! Nonetheless, when it comes to glass we do feel it’s important to celebrate this incredible material, to consider how long it has been in existence even in its crudest of forms, not to mention it’s supreme versatility; and to do this, we must look …
January 31st marked the end of our financial year – it is the time of year we reflect not only on how we performed financially but how we performed environmentally and socially, because business has to stand for more than just profit, right? Business for good, better business, the kindness economy, the positive pound – …
We’re still pinching ourselves over this one. We’ve sourced a quantity of these original classic street signs now decomissioned from the streets of New York City. Our batch of signs sat in a storeroom and never made it onto the streets
Vintage Industrial Lighting
Vintage lighting runs through our veins – for us, it’s where it all began.
Lighting with history
Trainspotters headed up the new vintage aesthetic of the early 2000s, bringing salvaged industrial to the mainstream with carefully sourced and expertly restored items at fair prices. Our expertise in finding large quantities of vintage industrial items meant the market was no longer niched to trade experts and antiques dealers, but available to anyone with an eye for the trend.
Popular culture influences
Pre-noughties lighting was in a nutshell, completely uninspiring! Buying ‘vintage’ lights meant lumping for poor quality cost-driven reproductions or out-dated Victoriana. The Cheers bar had lost its appeal and instead the red stone New York loft apartments of Friends and Sex In The City were the new go-to looks.
It was an exciting era and no location was out of bounds – vintage industrial lighting came from factories, churches and chapels, institutions, asylums and municipal streetscapes – all abandoned in favour of regeneration; yet all the time it was clear this was not a fly by night trend, each piece breathed integrity and they were exactly what people had been longing for.
A learning curve
The restoration process is a labour of love. Sourcing and buying (or as it’s otherwise referred to ‘reclaiming’) vintage lights is a skill but the refurbishment process to bring items back to their former glory is quite another story. It has taken years of trial and error to finely hone the talents that will ensure a vintage light looks both amazing and is inherently safe for the current market.
Lighting for life
Many resources are committed to perfecting the necessary techniques to provide top end vintage industrial lights. Sometimes there is an extra buzz of doing this for a rare or possible one-off item which is good enough to be lovingly restored and passed on to a new generation.
And so, the love affair with vintage industrial lighting continues.
Related Posts
Restoring Salvaged Lights
A significant part of Trainspotters’ business is vintage lighting, whether we’re salvaging, buying, restoring or selling, it’s how it all started and it continues to drive us forward. We are very lucky to have a skilful and knowledgeable (small) team who are happy and enthusiastic about spending the majority of their time here at New …
Glass Half Full
Vintage is our area of expertise but historians we are not! Nonetheless, when it comes to glass we do feel it’s important to celebrate this incredible material, to consider how long it has been in existence even in its crudest of forms, not to mention it’s supreme versatility; and to do this, we must look …
Our Impact
January 31st marked the end of our financial year – it is the time of year we reflect not only on how we performed financially but how we performed environmentally and socially, because business has to stand for more than just profit, right? Business for good, better business, the kindness economy, the positive pound – …
A slice of the Big Apple…
We’re still pinching ourselves over this one. We’ve sourced a quantity of these original classic street signs now decomissioned from the streets of New York City. Our batch of signs sat in a storeroom and never made it onto the streets