A wonderfully sculptural mid century lamp designed by John Brown for Plus Lighting, dating to approximately the 1960s.
Ingeniously designed to work as either a table lamp or wall light, the lamp features a beautifully simple steel tube frame which forms both the stand and base. When used on a table, the angled frame gives the lamp its distinctive tripod like stance; alternatively, the same metal frame can be used to hang the lamp on the wall, making it an unusually versatile piece of mid century lighting.
The large cylindrical shade is finished in black painted steel with a contrasting pale interior, directing a warm pool of light while retaining the clean, industrial appearance of the design. Mounted between the two sides of the frame, the shade can be tilted to alter the direction of the light, allowing it to be used for reading, task lighting or simply as an atmospheric accent lamp.
The combination of the minimal chrome-finished steel frame and bold black cylindrical shade gives the lamp a wonderfully architectural quality, with a pared-back form that feels as contemporary today as it would have done in the 1960s.
There are some minor marks and signs of wear to the painted and metal surfaces consistent with its age and use, adding to the character of this original vintage piece.
A particularly clever and distinctive example of British mid century lighting, combining John Brown’s minimalist design with genuine versatility – equally striking positioned on a desk, side table or mounted on the wall.
£195.00
In stock
Plus Lighting operated out of London in the 1960s, and that's about as much as the record tells us. No archive, no catalogue reprints, no design museum retrospective - just the lamps themselves, which is rather fitting for a maker from an era when plenty of good British lighting was produced, sold, used and never written about.
What survives speaks for itself. The pieces we've handled are simple and cleverly resolved: steel tube frames, cylindrical spun shades, and designs that do more than one job — the John Brown lamp of 1966/67 sits on a desk or hangs on the wall from its base, no modification needed.
Plus Lighting belongs to the same moment as better-known British names like Peter Nelson's Architectural Lighting — pared-back, geometric, quietly modern. The difference is you can still find a Plus lamp without a designer-name premium attached. For now, anyway.
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John Brown designed for Plus Lighting of London in the mid 1960s, and he’s one of British design’s genuine mysteries. His name survives on the record; almost nothing else about him does.
His lamp of 1966/67 tells you what kind of designer he was. A steel cylinder shade on a bent tubular frame, adjustable, and designed from the outset to work two ways — as a table lamp, or hung on the wall from its base. That’s not styling, that’s problem-solving. It came in black, grey, orange and green, and it still looks sharp sixty years on.
Anonymous designers made much of the furniture and lighting we now call mid-century. Brown very nearly joined them. We think work this good deserves the name kept attached.
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