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Originally Posted by Oviatt Building Fan
Yes, I was talking about the mid-Wilshire store's chandelier. The story I told comes from a 1970s interview with one of the Magnins involved. He readily conceded that the chandelier is a copy of Lalique's gargantuan one ... and he was very proud of the money he saved. Mr. Magnin also claimed in the interview that the chandelier was made by a local Southern Californian glassmaker in about three months; unfortunately, he didn't mention the glassmaker's name.
A few years ago, Lalique historian Nicholas Dawes confirmed to me that the chandelier's design is Lalique-inspired, to say the least.
The interview is described on page 201 of the book "Art Deco San Francisco: The Architecture of Timothy Pflueger", by Therese Poletti.
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The ones in the Beverly Hills store were made by Lalique, but some of them mysteriously "disappeared" after the chain closed in the '90s. Saks recovered some of them. I represented Saks at the time and heard stories of how much trouble they went to to chase them down so they could be re-installed in the store after it was converted into an extension of the main Saks store on Wilshire in Beverly Hills.