Passion, the type that burns spectacularly bright, can be found in some of the most unsuspecting places.
For Shannon Geiger, hers was found on Facebook Marketplace during the pandemic.
She was browsing through the IKEA cast-offs and chipped dishes that tend to litter the home section when her eyes fell upon something rather illuminating.
“It was a Loevsky lamp, which is a heavy brass—almost like a brass lace—and it’s got kind of iridescent crystals on it,” she said, her voice filling with the kind of hushed reverence usually reserved for religious experiences.
To Geiger, this lamp was just that.
“I kind of started with that one,” she said.
Antique lamp sparks renovation renaissance
What the Hollywood-regency era piece started, in fact, was Geiger’s fascination with antique lamps – researching their history, hunting them down, buying them, and bringing them into her home in Winnipeg’s Harbour View neighbourhood.
“It was almost like they kept finding me.”
Six years later, she has 173 lamps in her home – 68 in her living room alone.
Her husband had to upgrade their electrical panel just to facilitate her growing collection.
One of her favourite finds to date – a taxidermy peacock lamp. She saw them being sold online for upwards of $4,000.
It became her feathered white whale, and she, a curio Captain Ahab.
“I actually acquired three this past year for less than the price of one, so it’s almost like I manifest these things.”
Geiger’s house has similarly transformed around her sprawling lamp collection into a gothic, vintage paradise of excess.
Animal-print carpets, from zebra to cheetah to snow leopard, cover the floors. Ornate brass candelabras, cuckoo clocks, and vintage music boxes adorn the antique dressers, cabinets, and tables.
Think Edgar Allan Poe meets Tim Burton.
Quite simply – it’s a vibe.
“It’s kind of an acquired taste. You either love it or hate it, but most people love it,” she said.
‘I’ve always been a collector’
Geiger’s “Extreme Makeover: Lamp Edition” was not her first foray into décor and interior design. The self-described maximalist spent her teen years as something of a magpie.
“I’ve always been a collector. I’ve always been an over-doer of things,” she said with a laugh.
As a teen, she covered every inch of her bedroom, from floor to ceiling, with posters and merch of her favourite band, “Bush.” All her cherished grunge goods were procured in the early days of ‘90s dial-up online shopping, using the computer at her father’s trucking business.
Home renovation shows gave Geiger her next teenage obsession. She used their endless DIY tips and her own good, old-fashioned ingenuity to redecorate her parents’ home at their request.
She repainted the walls in horizontal, ombre stripes in different colours using techniques she’d learned from Debbie Travis.
“That was a lot of trust. I couldn’t trust my own teens at this point to do that,” she said.
Fast forward to 2020. Geiger and her husband, who own a tattoo shop, were just trying to get through the pandemic. Her four children were growing up, finding more independence every day.
Geiger looked around her house and decided it was time for a change.
“I had someone in my family for years tell me when I was planning to do fun things, ‘Nobody’s gonna buy your house when it looks like that,’ and I thought, ‘Well, I better not do that,’” she said.
“And then I finally realized, ‘Well, I’m not selling my house, so I’m going to do what I want,’ and that’s how I’ve kind of been ever since.”
She shares photos from her ever-evolving home with her 46,000 followers on Instagram.
While her maximalist aesthetic can be polarizing, Geiger hopes her home will inspire others to find their own metaphorical Loevsky lamp – something to turn their living spaces into similarly bright, personal spaces that both illuminate their inner selves and light up their day-to-day lives.
“Find what you love and be surrounded by it. It’ll work in your space if you love it.”
