LAMP MAKERS SEE THE LIGHT : FLORIDA-BASED MANUFACTURER'S DESIGNS, CREATIVITY SHINING ON.

Byline: Alina Matas The Miami Herald

Choosing the perfect lamp can be a painstaking step in decorating a home. Fine Art Lamps, a leading manufacturer of lamps and accessories based in Hialeah, Fla., takes the same pains in creating them.

``The designs that we sell are not merely sales,'' company owner Max Blumberg said. ``We're really engaged in making fine art, and I believe fine art lamps, small letters, is what will remain of our work here.''

At Hialeah facilities that occupy four buildings, more than 450 workers labor around the clock, blowing glass, bending iron, shaping resin and polishing ceramic.

They turn out about 150,000 lamps and other accessories a year, which Fine Art Lamps sells to such stores as Carl's Furniture and Burdines Home Gallery, where they retail for $300 to $3,000.

With Blumberg's philosophy that art and business can make a happy marriage, Fine Art Lamps has grown to about $50 million a year in sales.

Blumberg moved the company from Brooklyn to Hialeah in 1976, marking a new stage for a business that his father, Frank Blumberg, started in the 1940s as an electrical wiring factory. By the 1960s, the company had evolved into a mass producer of inexpensive cast lamps.

His father became ill, and Max Blumberg, who had graduated from Dartmouth University with a degree in French literature and art history, got involved in the business. His father put him in charge of a new ``better lamps'' division, and Blumberg, who had a taste for art and design, led the company into making brass, crystal, ceramic and iron lamps.

``When I was in school, I thought that business was just about making money, and I thought that wasn't enough,'' Blumberg said. ``When I went to work to help my father, I found it was challenging and very stimulating.''

Following the growth of the Sun Belt, Blumberg moved the factory to Hialeah, where he changed the company's focus. He stopped using ready-made parts, instead employing craftsmen, artists and potters, who began making ceramic lamps from scratch.

Today, designing and manufacturing from scratch still is credo at Fine Art Lamps, whose styles tend to be classic, ornate, dressy.

All final touches, such as surface carving, polishing and painting, are done by hand.

``It's the people that are the main asset,'' Galbraith said. ``I know it sounds corny, but this type of work requires artisan skill. It's not something you just pick up; it takes time.''

CAPTION(S):

Photo

Photo: (Color) Fine Art Lamps officers, from left, Alan Galbraith, Mark McDowell and Max Blumberg watch glass blower Mihai Tulbure create a lamp at the company's facilities in Hialeah, Fla.

Knight-Ridder Tribune Photo Service