I have the immense good fortune to live within a 10 minute’s walk of an excellent (and well-priced) antique mall. My husband and I go there often just to see what we can stumble upon to help us in our renovation project. A little bit back, I found these lovely cast iron doohickeys that I had no idea what they were! As an avid antiquer and watcher of “Antiques Roadshow,” that doesn’t happen to me often, so I was intrigued.
After managing to get in touch with the proprietor of that booth, it turns out that I had found some (broken) Victorian era swing arm curtain rods. They didn’t look much like curtain rods anymore, as the actual rod part had since broken off, and all that was left was the decorative ends. Works for me, because I didn’t want to use them as curtain rods anyways!
Here is a link to an article with examples of how these things worked with some photos: http://swingarmcurtainrods.blogspot.com/2012/02/look-for-right-kirsch-swing-arm-curtain.html.
These brackets got a new life by being turned 90 degrees to be used as corner highlights for a door frame. This room will (eventually) be more Art Nouveau inspired, so the brackets’ Nouveau/Arts and Crafts mix work perfectly for this room, to tie it to the rest of the house.
Enough chat – onward to photos!
Close-up
