Studio Timeless does not make a Champagne Bronze or an Oil Rubbed Bronze light switch, and neither word appears anywhere in our catalogue. One is a faucet maker’s own name for a colour. The other is an industry finish with a published code. Which one you are holding decides whether it can be specified at all.
In short
- Champagne Bronze is a manufacturer’s finish name. Delta Faucet Company filed a federal trademark application for the words on 2 September 2022, serial 97576538.
- Oil Rubbed Bronze is an industry finish with a number: BHMA 613, formerly US10B.
- BHMA 613 is specified as not colour-fast. The brown oxidation is expected to wear off within weeks of handling.
- Our only bronze is Aged Bronze (Hand-Brushed): lacquered, in stock, on 33 active products and 65 variants.
- We publish no UNS alloy designation and no BHMA code for any of our eight finishes.
Champagne Bronze is a brand’s name for a colour
Champagne Bronze belongs to a faucet manufacturer, not to the hardware industry. The United States trademark record we read on 28 October 2026 shows Delta Faucet Company as the applicant for the words CHAMPAGNE BRONZE, serial 97576538, filed on 2 September 2022, covering classes 2, 11 and 21, which include apparatus for lighting and for water supply and sanitary purposes. The record we read shows no registration number, so we describe it as an application and nothing more.
What follows is practical. No published table tells a second manufacturer how to make a Champagne Bronze: no test, no colour tolerance, no base material requirement. Anybody else using the words is matching by eye to somebody else’s product, which is why a pull and a faucet both sold as champagne bronze can sit on one island and read as two metals.
If your faucet is that finish and you want the room to agree with it, the honest route is to match against the real object rather than against the word. That is what the Finish Sample Set exists for, and why our finishes page shows all eight side by side under one warm light instead of describing them.
Oil Rubbed Bronze is an industry finish, and it has a number
Oil Rubbed Bronze is BHMA 613, formerly US10B, and that number is the difference. A coded finish has a published description that any manufacturer can work to. Allegion’s technical note on the finish describes how it is produced: the brass or bronze base material is dyed and oxidised to a brown colour, then satin polished and oil rubbed, and the oil slows the acceleration of the antique look until the hardware reaches the job site.
The same note carries the sentence a specifier needs: the BHMA 613 finish is not intended to be colour-fast. After a period of a few weeks the brown oxidation will wear off, due to handling. That is not a defect report. It is the finish working as written.
Why not colour-fast matters more on a switch than on a door
A light switch is touched more often than almost anything else on a wall. A door lever is gripped in passing; a switch plate is pressed, brushed and wiped several times a day, always in the same two square inches. A finish specified to wear where hands land will wear fastest on the object with the highest contact rate in the house.
That is not an argument against the finish, only for knowing what you bought. We make the same point in the other direction about unlacquered brass, which we do sell, which does change, and which we flag on the product page every time.
The one bronze we sell is called Aged Bronze, and it is lacquered
Aged Bronze (Hand-Brushed) is the only bronze in our catalogue, a lacquered finish on solid brass. Read today, it appears on 33 active products across 65 variants: the knurled toggle in 1 to 4 gangs, the rotary dimmer in 1 to 5 gangs, the Retro Toggle, every outlet we make, and the wall plates.
Because it is lacquered, it does not do what a 613 does. The colour you receive is the colour it keeps while the lacquer holds, which federal guidance on architectural metals puts at roughly ten years indoors before a coating needs attention. The same body of guidance is careful about the difference between a patina and a fault: the GSA bronze procedure instructs that during corrosion removal the bronze patina shall not be disturbed. What Aged Bronze actually is, in detail, belongs to its own article: what Aged Bronze actually is. This page is about the two names that are not ours.
What our own catalogue says, read word by word today
We searched the whole catalogue for each word on 28 October 2026, across product titles and across every variant option value, which is where the contract lives. The results are unambiguous.
- champagne: zero product titles, zero variant titles.
- oil and rubbed: zero product titles, zero variant titles.
- bronze: appears only as Aged Bronze (Hand-Brushed). There is no second bronze.
- copper: exactly two variants, both Antique Copper, both on one door hinge.
Antique Copper is our only other warm red-brown name. It lives on the heavy-duty plain butt hinge in two sizes and nowhere else in the hinge range or the electrical catalogue, and none of our thirteen hinge finish names contains the word bronze.
A file name is not a finish name, and ours proves it
Two of our six hinge photographs are stored under file names reading brushed bronze, including the main image of the hinge whose menu offers Antique Copper and no bronze at all. It is the clearest example we have of the rule that governs this subject.
A product title is marketing. A file name is an accident of production. An option value is the contract, because it is the only one of the three that appears on an order. We made the same point about gunmetal and french gold and about polished nickel, two names that live in titles and in no menu anywhere.
Bronze is a slippery word before any adjective is added to it
The metal itself does not settle the question either. The Copper Development Association’s wrought brasses datasheet places brasses in the C20000 to C49999 ranges and bronzes in C50000 to C52999 and C60800 to C66199, and two alloys sold as Architectural Bronze, C38000 and C38500, fall inside the brass ranges. The National Park Service puts it plainly in its survey of metals in historic American buildings: architectural bronze and commercial bronze contain zinc rather than tin.
BHMA’s own materials and finishes table makes the same point from the other side. Finish 612, satin bronze clear coated, is listed with brass as a base material. A finish called bronze does not guarantee a metal called bronze, which is why the only stable answer to what is this made of is a UNS alloy designation and not a colour name. We go through the four constructions sold as metal in metal light switch covers.
Two names you searched for, against the three things we actually have
| Name | Published code | Who owns the word | Does it change | On a switch here |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Champagne Bronze | None | A faucet maker, trademark application 97576538 | Not published | No |
| Oil Rubbed Bronze | BHMA 613, formerly US10B | The industry | Yes, by design, not colour-fast | No |
| Aged Bronze (Hand-Brushed) | None that we publish | Us | No while the lacquer holds | Yes, 33 products, 65 variants |
| Antique Copper | None that we publish | Us | Not published | No, one door hinge only |
| Unlacquered Antique Brass | None that we publish | Us | Yes, it patinates | Yes, made to order, not returnable |
The accent trap, and it is specific to Aged Bronze
On the knurled toggle, choosing Aged Bronze decides your insert for you. That range offers four accent values, Black Insert, White Insert, Brass Accents and Stainless Accents, but Aged Bronze opens only the Black Insert. Stainless Steel behaves the same way. Matte Black is the only finish with three accent choices.
The rotary dimmer escapes this, because a knob has no frame: its accents are Matching, Brass Accents and Stainless Accents. For an Aged Bronze bank with anything other than black showing, that is the range, and a combination plate mixes both formats on one opening. On a wider bank that choice interacts with the layout rules in planning a multi-gang bank.
What we would have to publish before we claimed any bronze
We stated this in public last week and it has not changed. We publish an eight-name finish menu and a plate thickness, and no UNS alloy designation, no temper, no ANSI/BHMA code mapped onto our names, and no refinishing instruction or service, even though refinishability is the argument for solid brass.
So if the specification in front of you says 613, or names an alloy, no page of ours answers it today. Write to us and we will answer in writing, which is a worse experience than reading it. The full version of that admission is in luxury switch plates, and the document a specifier actually submits is in what to put in a specification.
Questions to ask before you buy any bronze anything
| Question | Why it matters | Where a real answer comes from | Our answer today |
|---|---|---|---|
| Is this a coded finish | A code can be specified and checked | A BHMA number on the cut sheet | We publish none |
| What is the base metal | Bronze names sit on brass every day | A UNS alloy designation | We publish none |
| Is it coated | Decides whether the colour moves | A written yes or no | Yes on seven finishes, no on Unlacquered |
| Is it meant to change | 613 is specified not to be colour-fast | The finish description | Aged Bronze is not meant to change |
| Can I see it before I commit | Screens misread warm metals | A physical sample | Finish Sample Set, 50 dollars |
| Is it returnable | Made-to-order finishes often are not | The return terms | Unlacquered is not returnable |
If you truly need Oil Rubbed Bronze, buy it from a period hardware house
This is the honest ending. If your specification says oil rubbed bronze and means it, a period hardware retailer such as House of Antique Hardware carries plates in that finish and sells the mechanism separately, the opposite of how our products are built. We looked at that catalogue in detail in our comparison, including where their model costs about a third of ours per position.
Come to us instead for a one-piece unit rather than a plate plus a mechanism, for a warm dark tone that stays where it was on the day it arrived, for 4 Way wiring that is actually purchasable, or for a bank past three positions where plate and devices are one object. Matching a faucet brand’s colour name is not a reason we can honour.
How to match a warm metal without buying a name
Match against an object, in the light of the room, at the hour that matters. Put the Finish Sample Set beside the faucet or the pull, in daylight and again under the lamps you will use, because screens shift warm metals more than any other colour. That is the argument of verifying a finish before you order. For a wall with several positions, design your wall maps every switch from your photographs, send your plan is the trade route, and installation and compatibility covers openings, depth and wiring.
Frequently asked questions
Do you make a champagne bronze light switch?
No. Champagne Bronze is a finish name used by a faucet maker, and Delta Faucet Company filed a federal trademark application for the words CHAMPAGNE BRONZE under serial 97576538 on 2 September 2022. Studio Timeless does not offer a finish by that name on any switch, outlet or wall plate, and no product title or option value in our catalogue contains the word champagne.
Do you make an oil rubbed bronze light switch?
No. Oil Rubbed Bronze is a real industry finish with a code, BHMA 613, formerly US10B, but we do not offer it. Our one bronze is called Aged Bronze (Hand-Brushed), it is lacquered, and it is a different finish with different behaviour.
What is the difference between champagne bronze and oil rubbed bronze?
One is a brand name and the other is a coded finish. Champagne Bronze is a warm light gold tone sold under a manufacturer’s own name, with no published industry code behind it. Oil Rubbed Bronze is BHMA 613, produced by dyeing and oxidising a brass or bronze base to brown, then satin polishing and oil rubbing it, and the finish is explicitly not intended to be colour-fast.
Is oil rubbed bronze supposed to change colour?
Yes, and that is written into the finish. Allegion’s technical note on BHMA 613 states that the brown oxidation will wear off after a few weeks due to handling, and the finish is not intended to be colour-fast. On a switch, touched several times a day, that wear lands where the hand does.
What bronze finish does Studio Timeless actually sell?
Aged Bronze (Hand-Brushed). It is a hand-brushed lacquered finish on solid brass, in stock, and it appears on 33 active products across 65 variants, including the knurled toggle in 1 to 4 gangs, the rotary dimmer in 1 to 5 gangs, the Retro Toggle, every outlet and the wall plates.
Is Aged Bronze a living finish like unlacquered brass?
No. Aged Bronze is lacquered, so the colour you receive is the colour it keeps while the lacquer holds. The only living finish we sell is Unlacquered Antique Brass, which is made to order, carries a longer lead time and is not returnable.
Can I get a bronze accent or insert with the Aged Bronze switch?
Not on the knurled toggle. On that range Aged Bronze opens only a Black Insert, with no white, brass or stainless accent available. The rotary dimmer uses accent values of Matching, Brass Accents or Stainless Accents instead, because a knob has no frame.
Do you publish an alloy designation for your bronze?
No, and that is a gap we have stated in public. We publish no UNS alloy designation, no temper, and no ANSI/BHMA finish code mapped onto our eight finish names. If an alloy designation matters to your specification, ask us for it in writing before ordering.
Is bronze harder or more durable than brass?
Not in the way the words suggest. Industry naming is loose: the National Park Service notes that architectural bronze and commercial bronze contain zinc rather than tin, and BHMA’s own table lists 612 satin bronze with brass as a base material. The name on a page says very little about the metal underneath.
Where should I buy an oil rubbed bronze switch plate if I need one?
A period hardware retailer. House of Antique Hardware sells plates in oil-rubbed bronze and sells the mechanism separately, the opposite of our one-piece construction. We would rather send you there than sell a finish that is not the one you specified.
The short version
Champagne Bronze is somebody’s name for a colour. Oil Rubbed Bronze is a coded finish that is specified to change. Our Aged Bronze is a lacquered hand-brushed finish that is specified not to. Browse it on the toggle switches, the rotary dimmers, the outlets and the wall plates, or ask us anything you cannot find on a page through contact.
Last updated: 28 October 2026
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