Slag Glass for Dinner

Well hello dear friends and just before 2025 begins, I finally am taking the time to write about what I have been up to. I know I neglect to write as often as some of the blogs I love to follow. I find that work and time progress with often not as much completed as I would like. Thinking that I have been in my house nearly 20 years when the original intention of the house was a few short years. Funny how these old houses get ahold of you in a way that you love and yet will test every fiber of your being. With that being said I did complete a project that brings great visual thrills and while it wasn't such a small project, it certainly wasn't as big as many others that have been completed.  This one however was a treat because it ties the whole room together.  My dining room chandelier I had purchased perhaps 10 years ago off Ebay from a seller in Colorado I believe.  I was told that it came from an old demolished mansion and when I saw it, I knew it was something special.  A massive pink slag glass chandelier with 4 gas jets and 4 early electric socket arms and on the inside, a missing cluster socket.  Still this piece was something special and I am sure at the time shipping for me was quite expensive, but 10 years ago I cannot remember. 

As an avid antique collector, I have learned that when you see something you want, BUY IT IMMEDIATELY.  If you don't it will be gone and you will be kicking yourself for eternity wishing that you had purchased it. So I bought this beautiful piece and then, well it just sat in the basement, covered in a sheet for a decade, waiting for the day it would be restored and hung in the dining room.  Last year I began working on the dining room and well, this was the last piece to go up.  After it was hung I knew however I needed to add more to it to really make it feel VICTORIAN.  Having saved many period dining images, I knew many of these pieces had glass bead fringe and so I knew I wanted to add pink glass bead fringe to this amazing piece.  Here are some period images and advertisements that I took my inspiration from.

This period image appears to have fabric fringe, but I also used it for reference as to how high to hand the chandelier over the table.

This image helped me that YES pink fringe could go with pink slag glass.  Also notice the swirl candle covers and bobeches over the gas jets? Well of course I have those for the chandelier too as well as pink beaded bulb covers because why not.  The pink gas jet covers  and bulb covers match those on the sconces so they work well together I think.  So I ordered pink beaded fringe and began to sew it onto the light fixture which took me HOURS.  Yes it was a huge amount of work and was heavy so I used clothes pins to hold the fringe up and tight while I sewed it onto the fixture.

If you have Instagram, follow me under TheVintangeDandy.

Anyways so I sewed one section all the way around which took me maybe 4 hours.  The circumference is around 4ft I believe.  I liked it, but I didn't LOVE it.  So I thought, well maybe it just needs to be thicker, so I then decided to sew a 2nd layer of the beads on to get a really full look.  After hours and hours of sewing and my back killing me, it was complete and I must say I ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT.

I should mention that YES I did hang it high enough so that my pink epergne with flowers could fit under it, because you know, more is more with Victorians.

I also ended up swapping out the old rug for a new one in here.  I purchased a blue rug so that it blended better than the red rug that was here before.  So my dining room is NEARLY done.  I do need to do 2 more big projects in here.  One of them is refinishing the floors on the 1st floor of the house.  This obviously will involve moving everything out and that project will happen....when it happens... The other big project to do in here is to move the radiator.  Originally a radiator went under the picture window and for some reason that was removed and this big one was put on one side of the window.  It works fine, but throws off my symmetry, so my plan in 2025 will be to remove this radiator and put a new period one under the picture window.  This will involve multiple radiator moves and shifts which I don't look forward to, but my obsessive mind requires it to be done.  

With this room now fully functional as a dining room it brings me such great joy.  In the day I use the table as my office and work at the head of the table looking out the bright windows.  It is certainly a room that has character and life again.  It was used as a dining room for probably such a short time in the history of the house, so I hope that forever on, it will remain as such and bring lots of joy and good meals to those that eat under it's pink canopy of excessiveness.