• Filaments

  34 West 13th Street, 212-924-3575

  Ask Filaments owner Randy Howard about the oddest object he ever illuminated, and he’ll tell you about the man who wanted a piece of old dental machinery turned into a lamp. “Was it my personal taste?” asks Howard. “No. Was he happy? Yes.” Howard can make a lamp out of almost anything (a jardinier or a piece of glass are more common requests), but his main business is the restoration of vintage pieces from the turn of the last century up through the sixties. He also creates new lamps, usually inspired by mid-century-modern designs. Prices start at $40 for a miniature stained-glass table lamp and rise to $2,000 for a freestanding Castiglioni Arco. If you don’t have any medical equipment lying around, choose from the rotating selection of one-of-a-kind lamps—around 300 on any given day—Howard keeps glowing in his shop.

From the 2004 Best of New York issue of New York Magazine