NARRATOR:
Lamp for Fragrant Hill Hotel, Beijing, created circa 1982 by I.M. Pei, Calvin Tsao, and John Morford with metal, glass, and bronze wire. The lamp overall measures 47.5 centimetres high, 40.5 centimetres wide, and 40.5 centimetres deep.
This cylindrical table lamp is in an off-white cream colour, with a pattern of jagged gold lines and gold accents running across its entire form. At first glance, the lamp appears like a ceramic with countless cracks on the surface that are gold in colour.
The lamp is shaped like the capital letter ‘T’. Light shines from the short but wide cylinder that forms the top of the ‘T’. The vertical portion of the ‘T’, the body of the lamp, is a long vertical tube like the shape of the cardboard tube at the centre of a toilet paper roll. The tube connects the top cylindrical part and the base of the lamp. The lamp’s circular base looks like a standard dining plate. The side of the base is entirely covered in metal, and is the only surface of the base that is not covered in white- and gold-patterned shapes. A white electrical cord comes out from the bottom of the lamp and extends behind it.
When you look more carefully at the top of the lamp from above, you can see that there is an inner and outer cylinder. Both cylinders are fully covered so that you cannot see the light bulbs that are hidden within, and each cylinder has a very narrow band of metal circling its rim at the top. The outer cylinder contains the inner cylinder while being separated by a small open circular space.
