The lamp sits on a table behind the sofa in Thom Niforatos’s Glen Ellyn living room. It has a tree-trunk base–a nod to art nouveau designer Louis Comfort Tiffany–and a shade of green and purple stained glass studded with seashells and inset with images of grape clusters, scarabs, and red-eyed dragonflies.
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Hoosin, a deliberate, white-bearded man of 56, sells his creations out of a green-walled store in Lakeview. He and a small staff, including his brother Jeff, make the colorful lamps in a cramped studio in back, using a copper-foil process pioneered by Tiffany. Limpet and scallop shells, imported from the Philippines, Haiti, and Mexico, give the shades their distinctive look. Hoosin also designs lamps with gemstone and Prairie-style shades, as well as small rabbits and peacocks that light up and exotica like glass boxes containing beetles, blue morphos, walking sticks, and bats. “We can’t keep the bats in stock,” says Hoosin.
But it’s the lamps that inspire genuine devotion. Niforatos, who owns two, has given a dozen as wedding gifts. “The lamps are alive to me, like living art,” says theater photographer Jennifer Girard, who keeps four of them burning in her second-floor apartment in Lakeview to welcome her home each night. The lamps are now sold around the country; Steven Spielberg, Vanessa Williams, and Cher are among the owners. John Goodman recently wrote in for a replacement finial.
Raised a Conservative Jew, Hoosin turned Orthodox as he mastered his craft. In 1981, he says, “I suddenly felt the power of the Old Testament.” He perfected the use of a metal lattice around the base of the shades, which allowed him to work with more delicate shells. These days a small Hoosin table lamp starts at $200, standard table lamps run from $500 to $1,000, and floor models go for up to $1,800. The lighted animals and boxed insects start at $65. Each creation is signed and numbered, and commissions are welcomed.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/J.B. Spector.
