Frequently asked questions

Every lamp is built after you order it, so plan on 5 to 7 business days on the bench before it leaves Mariposa. Transit is on top of that: 1 to 3 days in California and the Southwest, 3 to 6 days for the rest of the continental US.

If a run of orders pushes the bench time out, we email you the same day with a real date. We would rather tell you it will be twelve days than quietly miss seven.

Shipping details

Yes, as long as we have not cut and threaded pipe for it yet. That usually gives you a day or two. Email us with your order number and what you want changed.

Finish swaps are easy right up until the wax goes on. After that we would be building you a second lamp, so at that point it becomes a return instead.

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Not on this version of it. This storefront is a demonstration build with no payment processor connected, so the cart adds up correctly but no card is ever charged and no order reaches the bench.

If you want a real lamp, email hello@craftsmancreations.com and we will handle it like we handled the first eight years of orders: a conversation, an invoice, and a box.

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Ground shipping is free on every order inside the continental United States. Alaska and Hawaii are quoted at cost. Expedited service exists — email before you order and we will price it rather than guess.

Shipping details

Canada on request. Everywhere else needs a conversation first, because each lamp is wired for 120 volts with a US plug and a step-down transformer is a poor answer for something you plug in every night.

Write to us and we will tell you plainly whether it makes sense for you.

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The bulb comes out and rides in its own molded insert. The lamp is wrapped, corner-blocked with foam, and double-boxed. It is all recyclable — no expanding foam, no peanuts.

If the box arrives crushed, photograph it before you unpack anything else and email us within seven days of delivery. We replace freight-damaged lamps outright. You do not pay return shipping and you do not file the carrier claim; we do.

Shipping details

Half-inch black iron pipe, threaded malleable fittings, cast floor flanges, and a brass or steel socket shell. Standard plumbing stock, cut and threaded here.

There are no welds and no glue anywhere in the structure. Every joint is threaded, which is why a lamp we built in 2015 can be brought back to new with parts that are on the shelf right now.

How they are built

It depends on the piece. The Wayfarer stands 17 inches to the top of the bulb on a 6 inch cast flange, the Merced is 15 inches overall, and the Companion sits low at 11 inches at the shoulder and 16 inches nose to tail. All three weigh between 5 and 6 and a half pounds. Exact dimensions are listed in the spec table on each product page.

They are heavy on purpose. A lamp this shape needs the mass at the bottom or it walks across the desk every time you turn the switch.

See the lamps

Blackened steel is the raw black iron darkened with heat and sealed with hand-rubbed wax. It reads nearly charcoal, with the mill markings still faintly visible on the pipe.

Aged brass is the same body with brass-finished fittings and socket, chemically aged to a warm brown-gold rather than a showroom shine. It costs ten dollars more than blackened steel because the fittings cost us more, and that is the whole reason. Stock lamps run $255 to $299 depending on the piece and the finish.

See the lamps

The Wayfarer is. Its arms and forward leg hold a friction fit tight enough to keep a pose and loose enough to change your mind. The Companion’s head pivots about thirty degrees left and right. The Merced is fixed by design.

Posing them is normal use, not abuse. If a joint eventually goes slack, that is ours to fix.

Warranty

Yes. A 40 watt amber ST64 Edison bulb ships seated in the socket, though it travels in its own insert rather than in the lamp. It is the bulb the lamp was designed around and the one in every photograph on this site.

Bulbs & care

A standard medium-base E26 socket, 60 watts absolute maximum. That is a hard ceiling set by the socket and the porcelain inside it, not a polite suggestion. A 75 watt bulb will cook the socket and it will void that part of the warranty.

Dimmable LED filament bulbs in the 2200K to 2400K range look right and run cool. Cool-white LEDs, frosted globes, and anything with a plastic heat-sink collar look wrong on an iron body.

Bulbs & care

Every electrical component is UL-listed: the socket, the cord, the plug, and the inline switch. We assemble them by hand, which is why the finished lamp carries listed components rather than a listing of its own — a two-person shop cannot afford to certify a lamp that we build twenty of a month.

Everything is rated for 120 volt indoor dry locations. Nothing in the lamp is potted, molded, or glued shut.

Six feet of twisted cloth cord in charcoal with an inline rotary switch about fourteen inches up from the plug, which puts it below the table edge on most desks, so you can find it in the dark without groping for the socket.

A smart plug works fine. A wall or plug-in dimmer works only with a bulb that says dimmable on the box — the included incandescent dims beautifully, a non-dimmable LED will buzz and flicker and eventually fail.

Bulbs & care

A dry cloth. That is the whole procedure. Dust it the way you would dust a book.

No glass cleaner, no solvents, no metal polish, no vinegar. The blackening is a surface conversion and polish will take it straight off, leaving a bright patch you cannot put back without sending the lamp home to us.

Full care instructions

Yes, and slowly. Blackened steel warms and deepens where hands touch it, usually visible after a year or two. Aged brass loses its yellow and turns browner over the same stretch, then keeps settling for years after that.

This is the material behaving correctly, not a defect, and it is the reason we wax rather than lacquer. A lacquered lamp looks the same forever and then looks chipped.

Full care instructions

Live with it for thirty days. If it is not right, email us with your order number and we send a prepaid UPS label the same business day. Full refund, no restocking fee, no explanation required.

Refunds land on the original payment method within three to five business days of the lamp reaching the shop.

Returns policy

For as long as you own the lamp, we cover failure in workmanship or materials: joints, flanges, socket, switch, and cord. We repair or replace, and we pay shipping both directions.

It does not cover bulbs, which are consumables, or patina, which is the finish doing its job. Drops, modifications, and bulbs over 60 watts fall outside it too, but tell us anyway — out-of-warranty repairs are billed at parts plus shipping and we have never turned one down.

There is nothing to register and no receipt to keep. Send a photo and a sentence about what is happening; we recognize our own work.

Warranty

We do, a few at a time. Common requests are a taller version of a stock piece, a matched pair for a mantel, a figure posed to a photograph, and lamps built into a customer’s own reclaimed base.

The process is a conversation, a sketch, a materials list, and a fifty percent deposit before we cut anything. Commissioned work starts around $450 and runs four to eight weeks from first email to shipping label, depending on what is already on the bench. We quote a fixed price before you commit, and if we misjudge the work that is our problem and not your invoice.

Commissions

Sometimes. If it is threaded pipe and standard fittings, probably. If it is welded or the socket is a proprietary part, probably not, and we will tell you that instead of taking your money.

Email photos of the whole lamp and a close shot of the socket and we will give you a straight answer within a day.

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