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Form Follows Function: Early Design for an Adjustable Industrial Task Lamp

Perhaps the inspiration for Dyson's Solarcycle lamp

By Rain Noe - March 22

in Lighting

You've perhaps seen Dyson's Solarcycle lamp, which is adjustable in a Cartesian fashion to provide light exactly where you want it.

It was probably inspired by this early-20th-century design for an industrial task lamp, produced by the Faries Manufacturing Co. of Decatur, Illinois. It's pure form-follows-function.

Both the horizontal and vertical members were designed to slide within the connector, allowing the user to adjust the height and horizontal projection of the light.

The lamp is made of brass. My guess is it was painted red at some point after it had been removed from the factory in which it was used; paint on metal doesn't make much sense for parts meant to slide over one another.

This other version, also by Faries, can be seen in what was likely the original finish.

Note that the different position of the bulb and socket in this design necessitated adding a gooseneck.

It also has an added feature lacking in the painted model: A handy ring up top for moving the lamp.

The two lamps above are being sold by antiques dealer Industrial Artifacts, at the individual links above. Asking price is $1,250 for the painted one and $1,835 for the gooseneck. I'm in the wrong line of work.

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Dee An

8 months ago

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It's more likely that the Dyson design team were inspired by retort stands, as found in every British secondary school chemistry classroom.

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Leandro Heck

8 months ago

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The cable is definetelly coming from the wrong place of the pole. Sad, and visually horrible.

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