Identifying Fantasia Lamps.

Fantasia lamps often featured a sticker on the base of the lamp which confirmed the model name and on the inside there is usually a sticker confirming this too. If you can't idenify the lamp due to there being no names please take a look at the photos or simply email us at: hippielight@googlemail.com - Thank you. Fantasia - The Lamp of a thousand lights ... Thousands of optical fibers come alive with color and motion ... fiber tips flash like stars bright with changing reds, greens, blues and yellows. As colors vary, the fiber optic spray itself turns, adding motion to the shifting pattern of light. FANTASIA is made only of genuine glass fibers - no plastics. Fantasia continued producing lamps all the way till the early 2000s (later models were made in China however to a very high standard), until the company ceased to trade.

With over 10,000 fibers - far more than other lamps - there are more lights and changing patterns. Fantasia lamps are more beautiful ... enjoy their beauty in your own home as decorative accents - for family room, bar, picture window, TV and at a party. Or use them in a professional office or waiting rooms. Fantasia - the lamp of a thousand lights and a thousand uses. With special thanks to: Kristopher Steel, George Stadnik, Bohdan Rudy, Matt Woodham and Bob Chudy.

The Original Fantasia Fiber Optic Range, The Significance of the Fantasia Firefly and the beautiful Celestial.

Fantasia originally started with one lamp which would be known as the Fantasia Firefly, often described as the original Fantasia design. It was the first Fantasia fiber optic lamp that would inspire and lay the groundwork for Fantasia to develop a full range of beautiful fiber optic lamps. It is also one of the most popular fiber optic designs that was very well commercially received.

It should be noted the Firefly is what the Century (Model 100) is to US manufactured Lava Lamps and what the Astro lamp is to Original British manufactured lava lamps. Firefly was a defining product that redefined kinetic lighting. It would be continued to be manufactured by Fantasia for a very long time and saw many different aesthetic different versions but it is most often seen with its original black and sleeve and chrome detailing on the top and base.

Firefly took Fantasia to create other designs, such as Love Story which offered a similar design with intricate brass metal details and a soft pink sleeve. Trophy was a more masculine design with a hexagonal walnut veneered base with gold metal work. Other designs such as Celestial which is www.fantasialight.com's most favorite design presents the Fantasia fiber optics revolving and enclosed in a darkened sphere with a white flared pedestal. Olympic which is rarely seen, presented a pole fiber optic floor lamp. These designs were the first defining Fantasia fiber optic lights.

Kind Words, Origins of Fantasia and Introduction from Keith Knowlton - President of Fiberoptics Technology, Inc.

We started Electro Fiber Optics in November of 1967 in the second floor of an old wooden machine shop in Worcester Mass. We had left Mosaic Fabrications because it had been sold to Bendix, confusion was rampant (If the boss calls... Get his name) and also we were in our early 20's and itching to have our own company. From then until about 1971 or so, we built a new building in West Boylston Mass and did well by making fiber optic light distribution blocks for use in computers to read IBM 80 column punched cards. But, by about 1971, the floppy disk had been invented and punched cards went the way of the Dodo... Fast!

Whoa, now we had no products! Luckily for us, it happened that a new company had been formed recently in New England which had five different divisions. One, in Southbridge Mass., was starting to make fiber optic lamps and one other, in Framingham Mass., was in the laser business. However, the laser division stepped on the toes of the giant Union Carbide Corporation in the form of alleged patent infringement, and all their resources were quickly used up fighting the lawsuits. This left the fiberoptic lamp portion of their business broke as well.

I went to look over the operation with an eye toward buying it, but when I saw what little they had, we just bought parts ourselves and started to make lamps, although I have to admit that ours did look a LOT like the ones they had been making.

We took the first 24 that we made, which were the basic Firefly model, to Spag's Discount Store in Shrewsbury Massachusetts. Anthony Spag Borgatti (Spelling?) was the first discounter in the U.S. and his motto was "No bags at Spag's" You had to bring your own bags and stuff was cheap. We asked him if we could put them on the shelf and he asked what we needed to get for them to which we replied "$23 each". He marked them at $24.88 retail.

We took turns standing around to hear what people had to say about them and they were well received and sold out quickly, so we hurried to make 24 more and do it all again. Soon we realized that they might be the answer to our prayers. We hired Al Landes and his wife Lillian from New Jersey to market them and he knew his craft. He had a showroom in NYC and contacts all over the world. We sold tons of them in Japan, and the Lava folks sold them in Italy for us too. Spencer gifts was the really big outlet in the USA.... They would bring us a 50 foot truck trailer to fill and as soon as it was filled they'd replace it with another. Al kept beating up on us for new designs and products which is where the glitter lamp and the boxes came from.

Surprisingly, all the sprays were trimmed by hand in the dark by people using barber's clippers but the clippers didn't last all that long cutting glass.

When we left what was by then Valtec to form Fiberoptics Technology the lamps were still going strong, but subsequent to that, the lamp business was sold to Lenny Scrivo (Vicon) who moved production offshore. Later, FTI sold a company we had purchased to Lenny, and about 3 years ago we purchased some of the fiber drawing equipment from the defunct Vicon Fiberoptics. Funny how life changes.......

It wouldn't be too hard for us to make replacement sprays if enough folks out there have lamps and would like replace the old fibers. Most likely the biggest problem would be getting liability insurance in the sue everybody mentality world of 2009.

Anyway, thanks for all your work putting up the website, it sure brings back a load of fond memories. KLK

Fantasia's Glitter Graphic Series. Please see images below. Fantasia created three generations of glitter lamps. One of the most beautiful kinds of glitter lamps was the Glitter Graphic series. A Glitter Graphic lamp is manufactured from a wooden box and features a very beautiful graphic piece of artwork on the front. Inside this wonderful box, there is a glitter lamp placed inside with a wide reflector. The result of this is very beautiful glittering effects on the surface of the graphics.

The whole boxes become alive and provide a very beautiful array of effects. The Glitter Graphics can be seen in the wonderful image seen below, donated kindly by Jonas. Please see the image below to document the styles produced. The biggest question is which one is your favourite. I personally admire the design with the unicorn and the rainbow.

Color editions: Dragon, unicorn/rainbow, clouds/rainbow, parrot/jungle, tropical fish, porcelain mask. One color plus black/white/gray: Rolls-Royce/Poverty sucks, big rig truck, saloon, bar open, happy hour.

The Stunning Fantasia Cosmic Window. Please see images below.This page is also dedicated to the stunning Fantasia Cosmic Window.

Fantasia created three generations of glitter lamps. The Cosmic Window lamp was a very beautiful unique glitter lamp that featured a tube of fast moving glitter inside a cylindrical bottle, this was then mounted into an all reflective enclosure. This enclosure featured a reflective mirror at the back and created stunning reflections at the back of the bottle and excentuated the glittering effect.

The Cosmic Window is one of my very favourite glitter lamps. Fantasia definately created something very different with the Cosmic Window. This shows that alongside the Fiber optic based products they did have a wide range of stunning pieces.

Please see images below: