sylvania halo | Hepcats Haven

1957 Sylvania Halolight Blonde Tabletop Television

Posted on May 30, 2016 by Hepcats Haven

Please excuse those unsightly cords, I plan to remedy that soon enough.

A while back I came across this television in Sacramento. I thought it might be a good conversion project for our friend Justin of Stellar Electronics. Justin said he liked the tv, so I offered to pick it up. But, once I picked it up I fell in love with it! It was so clean and even had the original floor stand.

I asked Justin if he would be interested in a conversion trade for our 1960 GE conversion that he completed for us sometime back. Luckily, he agreed. The General Electric conversion was dynamite, but this style TV works better with our decor.

This television is now in our guest bedroom. I refinished the cabinet to match the Franklin Shockey bedroom set in the room. It all looks so fantastic together.

These are nondescript corner speakers. I plan to replace the fabric on both of them with something atomic. I’ll also refinish them in the champagne Heywood Wakefield toner sold by Jeff at Needful_Useful_Things on eBay.

These are the corner mount wall speakers that Mel and I picked up to complement the Sylvania. I plan to rewire them and get them hung in time for the up and coming Sacramento Mid-Century Modern Home Tour.

Justin also added more modern connectivity to the back of the set.

Of course, this is what these televisions are known for, the ring of light on the front. I am so glad we have a Halo in our collection now. This is such a unique television.

This television has a pleasing glow and has multiple setting for the brightness of the surround.

We had this fantastic asian television lamp that I knew would look great on this set. The whole idea of the Halo television was to make tv lamps obsolete, but I couldn’t help myself.

I plan to just have a DVD player hooked up to it so guests can watch any of the classic movie flicks we have in our collection.

This was the last piece of furniture to add to this room. I couldn’t be more pleased with the look of this room.

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Posted in Restorations, The Makin's Of Our Pad and tagged 1950's television, 1950's tv, 50's television, 50's tv, atomic electronics, atomic television, atomic tv, fifties television, fifties tv, halo, halo television, halo tv, mid century electronics, mid century television, mid century tv, Midcentury electronics, midcentury television, midcentury tv, Philco Television, Philco TV, rare television, rare tv, retro electronics, retro television, retro tv, sylvania halo, sylvania television, vintage electronics, vintage television, vintage tv. Bookmark the permalink.

The Death of the Vintage TV Lamp

Posted on June 6, 2014 by Hepcats Haven

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To me, TV lamps are pieces of art. There were so many different ones made by a lot of different manufacturers (Royal Fleet, Maddux, Lane, Texans Inc., Kron, Fuhry & Sons, Jacquelin, Royal Haeger…). These lamps became essential once televisions started showing up in homes. When watching the early televisions you had to watch them in almost complete darkness because of the low luminosity, making low light viewing a genuine benefit. The common belief was that watching the television in complete darkness caused eyestrain, hence the birth of the television lamp.

Sylvania came out with this new revolutionary HaloLight feature which helped eliminate eyestrain and the need for TV lamps.

Mel and I were contacted by one of our friends who informed us that she came into possession of the very rare Sylvania HaloLight television. She asked if we were interested and of course you know what we said. I shot over to pick it up. The cabinet on this unit is in good shape for its age. I plan to refinish it so it is perfect. I love the lightning bolt on the right side.

Once this is refinished it will look great.

The control panel is pretty clean on this unit. I plan to replace the fabric with something a little less ratty.

Here she is all lit up! Yup, it still works. Our friend Justin of Stellar Vintage Electronics said that if the Halo works you are ahead of the game because they are custom fluorescent tubes.

This unit has only one speaker so I don’t imagine it will compare to the modern televisions. If Justin can’t get this unit to work, it will be retrofitted with a modern tube and will be good to go for many more years to come.