Thursday, July 19, 2012

DIY: Updated Lamp Shades

I saw this lacy lamp shade post on Pinterest and really liked the look of the lace. I happened to have two blank lamp shades that were begging for a makeover.

I decided to do the lace treatment to one of the shades that was in our bedroom and chose to wrap the second shade in yarn and put it in our basement.

Basically, I followed the exact steps listed in the link above, so I'm not going to rehash the whole process, but will offer a few tips at the end of the post that I wish I would have known.

First, the lacy lamp shade.


My lamp shade was a dark gray color, so I stuck the lace on top of that and spray painted white. My friend also made one, but her lamp was white and she spray painted navy over the lace.


I really like how it looks and the lamp goes nicely with the colors in our room. Once I get the bedroom completely decorated how I want it, the lamp will tie in nicely. 

Now for the tips:
1. Make sure you stick the lace down really well with a repositionable spray adhesive. There are some spots on our lamp shades that got a little blotchy because the lace wasn't completely stuck down. Fortunately, we were able to just turn those parts toward the wall.

2. Use light, even coats of spray paint. I think I went a little too heavy handed in some spots. 

3. My friend's lamp shade was a weird shape and it was tough to get the lace cut out to fit the shade. We ended up cutting two sections that looked like a 3rd grader cut them, but it worked in the end. But, I would definitely say this method is easiest on a perfectly round or square lamp shade. 

I wrapped my second lamp shade in yarn. I had this pinned, so I figured I'd whip up my own version. I already had some gray yarn and then I picked up a really nice goldenrod yellow color. I really didn't have a reason for that color combo other than I like gray and yellow together. 


There is a nice ugly strip of yarn in the back where I stopped and started the different colors of yarn, but I'm not sure how that could be avoided. Again, I just faced that side to the wall and it looks just dandy. 



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