Rare Apple Blossom Table Lamp

Rare Apple Blossom Table Lamp
Tiffany Studios
circa 1906

This rare Tiffany lamp features an early variation of the “Apple Blossom” shade, likely designed by Clara Driscoll or one of the Tiffany Girls around the turn of the twentieth century. This 12-inch diameter “Apple Blossom” model was listed in Tiffany Studios’ 1906 Price List, but by 1910 the company had discontinued the size in favor of the 16-inch diameter shade more commonly seen today.

This shade depicts asymmetrical branches of an apple blossom tree, limbs laden with flowers and buds in both streaky and mottled Tiffany glass in variegated shades of pink, with deeper pink used for the unopened flower buds, surrounded by leaves in mottled green glass. The branches, articulated in streaky brown glass mimicking tree bark, descend from the upper border row as well as rise up from the lower border row, with some branches overlapping the lower edge. The delicate floral motif is accented by a background of translucent periwinkle blue glass.

The shade is paired with an original bronze “Miniature Tree Trunk” base in rich brown patina.

An example of this rare shade is in the permanent collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art (2018.284).

Louis Comfort Tiffany instructed the artists at Tiffany Studios to translate the Apple Blossom motif into a variety of media. In addition to a line of Tiffany Lamps, Apple Blossoms appear in floral paperweight favrile glass vases, enamel on copper vessels, and a photograph by Louis Comfort Tiffany in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art (53.679.1805).

Height: 18 inches (45.7 cm)
Diameter: 12 inches (30.5 cm)

Reference:

Martin Eidelberg, Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen, Nancy McClelland, and Lars Rachen, “The Lamps of Louis Comfort Tiffany” (The Vendome Press, 2005), pg. 88