All that glitters
ALL THAT GLITTERS BY NIKI SULLIVAN; niki.sullivan@thenewstribune.com
Ken Kelly is to vintage lighting and fixtures what Willy Wonka is to chocolate.
Walk inside Vintage Hardware, through the monstrous Port Townsend storefront that he helped design and construct, and you’ll find mint-condition antique lighting mixed in with painstakingly detailed replicas of some of the most sought-after antique doorknobs, lights, hinges and ephemera in the world.
The Bay Area native, with a gray beard and a voice like Garrison Keillor, has also done custom reproductions for the White House (yes, that White House) and for dozens of major films.
“Anything that people need,” he said. “We’ve done some very interesting projects.”
That includes a lamp base for a woman he met at the Tacoma Home Show several years ago. She brought in a base she’d inherited that had busted into 10 big pieces and even more small fragments.
“Everybody laughed at her,” he said.
Not Kelly. He put it back together, took a mold and made an identical replica.
“When we brought it back to her, there were tears in her eyes,” he said.
As if all this isn’t enough, Kelly also maintains the Kelly Art Deco lighting museum in an upstairs portion of the shop. The museum is dedicated to American-made slip-shade lighting, popular for about a decade during the Great Depression. There are a few hundred mint lamps on display, each with its own history.
“I’m a magpie. I have far more stuff than I’ll ever need,” he said, walking through the back offices of the shop, where bits of antiques are splayed on the floor – the inspiration for a new light design – or sitting on shelves, waiting to be tinkered with.
Although there might be an antique around – or lodged in – any corner, they’re put there with care.
“Wherever you look, there’s samples and stuff and collections and thought processes,” he said.
“I have to be surrounded,” he said, like a college professor with volumes of books. “You’re surrounded by stuff
and you start to get ideas and put it together.
“Suddenly you wake up at 3 in the morning and you go, ‘Yeah!’”
REMAKING AN ANTIQUE
In Kelly’s 9,000-square-foot storefront, it’s sometimes difficult to tell an antique from the real thing. He’s not out to pass off fakes: He’s out to create the most detailed replicas possible.
The process varies, but for existing antiques it generally involves taking apart the object, making molds and tinkering. For new designs, Kelly brainstorms before drawing up detailed drafts and then making a mock-up. He’s careful to choose materials that are as close to the originals as possible.
There’s one distinct difference between Vintage Hardware’s reproductions and the originals: Kelly uses compact fluorescent lighting in his designs to save energy.
“The CF bulbs are six times more efficient than incandescent,” he said. He’s also working on a way to use light-emitting diodes, which are even more efficient.
He has thousands of pieces in the store and a catalog – including the iconic MGM Grand door knocker with a lion’s head. Prices range from a few dollars to thousands.
Custom work, like putting a lamp back together or creating a duplicate of antique hinges from an old Victorian home, can be tricky. The price all depends on what type of technology is required and what molds Kelly needs to use.
For complicated pieces where designers must spend a lot of time getting the design and the molds just right, “I tell people, the first one will cost you $15,000, the second one will cost you $10.”
THE BEGINNING
Kelly, the son of an antiques dealer, took an apprenticeship in clock-making about 40 years ago while living in Europe. Through the trade, he learned the ropes in antiques. From there, he moved home to the Bay Area to collect antiques and tinker with reproductions.
On a business trip to Hong Kong in 1978, he met the woman who would become his wife and business partner, Jane.
After a long-distance courtship, they were married and Jane moved stateside. Now, the two visit Jane’s home country at least twice a year: To visit family and oversee the factory they built there where all of their designs are made.
Kelly probably would have stuck with his California-China business model were it not for a friend who vacationed in Washington several years ago.
His friend told Kelly he visited a small town called Port Townsend. He loved it so much, he made Kelly promise to visit.
He fulfilled his promise, and was just as smitten as his friend.
“I just fell in love with it,” he said.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Niki Sullivan: 253-597-8658
Want to meet the people behind Vintage Hardware? Visit the Tacoma Home & Garden Show, where they’ll have a booth (with catalogs and samples).
Here’s what you need to know.
What: Tacoma Home & Garden Show
When: 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Jan. 30-31, 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Feb. 1-2, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Feb. 3
Where: Tacoma Dome
Cost: $9 for adults, $7 for adults 62 and older on weekdays and free to children younger than 12. For a $2 coupon, visit the Web site.
For more information: Visit
www.otshows.com and click on Tacoma Home & Garden Show.
Niki Sullivan, The News Tribune
