The Wayfarer in blackened steel, photographed on the bench in Mariposa.
Mariposa, California · Building since 2011
Every lamp is cut, threaded, and lit by hand before it ships.
Craftsman Creations is two people and one bench on Highway 140. We cut black iron pipe to length, thread it by hand, blacken and wax the fittings, wire it with UL-listed parts, and leave it lit on the test rack for two hours before it goes in the box. Three designs. Built to order in five to seven business days.
Lamp #0001 shipped in the fall of 2011. We are somewhere past three thousand now, every one of them signed and dated underneath the base.
Free US ground shipping
Free across the continental US, double-boxed with the bulb packed separately. Alaska and Hawaii quoted at cost.
Lifetime warranty
A joint loosens or a socket fails, we repair it. Freight both ways on us.
Built to order
Five to seven business days on the bench, then it goes out.
30-day returns
Live with it a month. Wrong room, wrong lamp, send it back.
The bench, currently
Three lamps. We would rather build these well than build ten.
Each one is offered in blackened steel or aged brass, wired for 120V, and shipped with a 40W amber Edison bulb already in the socket. Prices start where they start because the parts cost what they cost.
The Wayfarer
From$289
A figure caught mid-stride, carrying the light.
- Height
- 17" to top of bulb
- Weight
- 6 lb 4 oz
- Finish
- blackened steel or aged brass
The Companion
From$269
The dog that waits up for you.
- Height
- 11" at the shoulder
- Weight
- 5 lb 8 oz
- Finish
- blackened steel or aged brass
The Merced
From$255
Two flanges, one clean arc of light.
- Height
- 15" overall
- Weight
- 5 lb 2 oz
- Finish
- blackened steel or aged brass
- Founded
- 2011
- People
- Two
- Lamps a month
- About 20
- Shop
- 4821 Highway 140
Mariposa, California
A two-person shop between the river and the road to Yosemite
Mariposa is a town of about two thousand people in the Sierra foothills, thirty miles from the Yosemite gate, with the Merced River running below it. Craftsman Creations is one metal building off Highway 140, set back from the road: a pipe vise, a bandsaw, a threading machine older than either of us, and a wall of black iron fittings sorted by size in coffee cans.
We started in 2011 with one lamp built for the workbench, because the light over it was bad, and never got around to stopping. There is no production line and no third employee. One of us cuts, threads, and finishes; the other wires, tests, packs, and answers the email. When you write to us, that is who writes back, usually the same day unless it is a Monday.
We are honest about the limits. We can build roughly twenty lamps a month, so in November the queue gets long and we say so on the product page rather than quietly slipping the date. Every lamp is signed and dated on the underside of the base, which is also how we look up your build if something ever goes wrong with it.
“Pipe is honest material. You cannot hide a bad joint under a finish, so we do not try. If a thread is crooked, it goes back in the bin.”
We are on the bench Monday through Thursday, 8 to 4, and Friday morning until noon. Visits are by appointment, so give us a couple of days notice if you are passing through on the way up to the valley and we will make sure someone is there and the threading machine is off.
From pipe to light
Four passes across the bench, in the same order every time
None of this is proprietary. It is just the sequence that produces a lamp that stays square and stays lit, and skipping any part of it shows up eventually.
Cut and thread
Half-inch black iron pipe is cut to length on a manual pipe cutter, then threaded on the machine. Every thread gets deburred and checked against a fitting before it earns a spot on the bench.
Dry-fit and square
The lamp goes together loose first so the stance can be set by eye and checked against a machinist square. We mark the fittings with a paint pen, then take the whole thing apart again.
Blacken and wax
Parts are degreased, then cold-blackened or brushed back to bare brass depending on the finish. Two coats of paste wax, rubbed in by hand and buffed between coats. No spray lacquer.
Wire and burn in
UL-listed socket, twisted cloth cord, inline rotary switch, strain relief at every pass-through. The lamp stays lit on the test rack for two hours before it is signed, dated, and boxed.
Hands-on time is about seven hours a lamp. The five to seven business days we quote is mostly the degreaser bath, the blackening rinse, and the wax cure, none of which can be hurried.
What comes back to us
Notes from people who have lived with one a while
The Merced has been on the corner of my home office desk for two winters now, five or six hours every evening. The wax finish still looks like it did the week it arrived, and the switch is out on the cord where you can find it without groping around the base.
Dana R. · Bend, Oregon
The Merced · owned two years
Bought The Companion for the entry table and everybody who comes through the door puts a hand on it. It is heavier than the photos suggest, which turned out to be the good news, because the dog does not budge when a coat bag hits the table.
Marcus T. · Sacramento, California
The Companion · owned eight months
I emailed to ask whether the Wayfarer would hold its pose with a heavier globe bulb. Someone wrote back that afternoon having actually gone and tried it, with the answer and a caveat about the shoulder joint. Fourteen months in, the arms have not sagged.
Priya S. · Ann Arbor, Michigan
The Wayfarer · owned fourteen months
All three arrived by email and are published with permission, trimmed only for length. We do not run a review widget, and we have never asked anyone for a star rating.
4821 Highway 140 · Mariposa, California
Pick one off the bench, or tell us what you have in mind
Three lamps are ready to build today. If none of them fits the corner you are trying to light, send dimensions and a photo and we will tell you honestly whether we can make it in pipe.
A note on honesty: this storefront is a demonstration build. The cart and checkout work end to end, but no payment processor is connected, so no card is ever charged and no lamp is ever actually cut.