Bart Niswonger picks Johnny Swing's floor lamp

“I am always fascinated by exposed structures like this. It reminds me of the Brooklyn Bridge,” said Niswonger of a large floor lamp by Johnny Swing. Niswonger also applauded the repurposed jar lids that form the lamp’s hovering dish-shaped reflector.

Swing, a licensed structural steel welder who likes to talk about his artistic endeavors perpetrated around New York’s Lower East Side, such as the ornaments on Houston Street’s Red Square Condo, is now known for heroic custom furnishings like this lamp. Niswonger admired its steel filigree, arched steel trusses, and countless, fastidiously welded connections. But steel aside, Swing mostly uses blatantly cheap materials, in some cases, the sort you'd find in a 5 and 10. His popular Nickel Couch uses 7,000 five-cent pieces to create a seating surface, which tells you where the true value of his work lies, not to mention his humor.

Photo by Pierre Alexandre de Looz