Home Decor DIY: Rustic-Looking Chicken Wire Lamp

I love the idea of up-cycling vintage home accents & accessories; it’s budget friendly, creative, and it gives you instant gratification. Rummaging through mom’s storage room, I came out with a broken ceramic table lamp, and a vintage wooden pitcher that has this beautiful rustic look. By marrying the two, I re-created this lampshade.

The chicken wire is just a fantasy of mine, but it’s not practical once you turned the lights on. I decided that I will leave it the way it is, though. I just love the way it looks, besides, I can always change the lampshade if I wanted to.

The lamp base

The ingredients for this lamp are:

• A broken lampshade: … so I would use the lamp’s wired candlestick & bottle adapter (this is what they call’em apparently) – I didn’t take a photo of the original lamp, but you can see the lamp candlestick on the far right side of the above pic.
• A shade riser: I totally DIYed mine using the metallic ring you see in the pic, and some wire to create a middle ring and tripod to help me attach the shade to the lamp skeleton.
• Chicken wire
• Scissors or Wire cutter.
• Some skill in wiring and rewiring lamps. Well… that’s my husband’s domain.
• Newspapers or sponge.

What you basically do is ask the electrician to insert the lamp’s cord through the nozzle of the vintage wooden pitcher you have and to keep the switch close by.

Insert the pipe that comes at the tail of the lamp skeleton inside the vase (the vase should be deep enough to accommodate it). To keep the lamp from moving, and to be able to change your mind later on, try to stabilize it by squishing in some crumbled newspapers, or sponge, or whatever that can just keep the lamp in place.

The lampshade

Now, if you have a shade riser then all you need to do is just cut the chicken wire to size and attach it to the shade riser.

But if you don’t have one, just use an old round ring, and using craft wire, you can create your own shade riser.

Watch out for your fingers when you cut the chicken wire. You can use the loose wire ends from the chicken wire to attach it to the ring.

Anyhow, with this kind of base, you can amplify the rustic look by using a basket as your lampshade. The effect it gives once you turned the lamp on is so cool. You can run your own lamp fashion show and try different lampshades until you finally find your beat. The important thing to remember is that imagining what a final product looks like has nothing to do with actually trying to make it & seeing for your self. A DIY looks much better in reality!

Cheers,

Karboojeh

 

 

Crafty DIY: Valentine’s Day Heart Magnets

Valentine’s Day is a month or so away. Now that Christmas and New Year’s Eve are well behind us, it seems craft bloggers are busy coming up with creative ideas for making heart-shaped gifts, all handmade and wrapped within a layer of love. Karboojeh Handmade Jewelry‘s heart magnets fit perfectly within the occasion.

I made these hearts early last year (2011) as part of a gift combo dedicated for little girls. I started my crafting “career” with accessories for young ladies, and evolved from there into a more grown up target audience.

Ingredients:

Linen scraps (beige and red), denim scraps, twine, baby flower clips, fabric & felt scraps for the stuffing, handmade foam stamps (and ink or felt-point sharpies), white cotton thread, and different colors of ordinary floss for sewing. And, of course, two needles, a soft a big.

When I took part in my – “technically”  – 1st craft show that the Italians put together late 2011, I decided to turn these heart softies into fridge magnets. So, I bought a magnetic roll (which you can cut into pieces using plain scissors), and adhered them to the back of the heart softies using really hot glue gun (or else they won’t adhere).

And this is the final product… cute little magnetic hearts.

I love how each is crooked and un-uniformed :)

Wishing you all a life-time of love and possibilities,

Karboojeh

Tutorials & DIY

Inspiration Board: Lace Tape to decorate your life

Lace Tape - via oboiler.com

I just got back from a web journey over at decor8, specifically at a post celebrating Lace Tape. decor8 asked: “I’m curious… any ideas for using this tape in creative ways OUTSIDE of the intended purpose?”. Here is what I came up with:

• Decoration: I think this kind of tape can be used to decorate plain note/sketch books, which then can be given away as gifts.
• Stenciling: it’s also a cool way to stencil a boring pen, by wrapping a thin piece of tape around it, and you got yourself a stylish pen that makes you want to jot down ideas.
• Deco: Let’s say you have a big boring mirror with no frame, no nothing; I think the lace tape can give it an oomph for a frame, and if you don’t like it use your hair dryer to peel it off.
• Jewelry-making: I can see myself using this tape in my jewelry in small dozes, maybe behind a memory glass pendant.
• DIY: and of course, a torn out old book that has all the good recipes can use a nice binding with this sticky lace.
• Jewelry display and packaging: And, for handmade jewelry crafters, like moi, this tape is a heaven-sent tool for nicer jewelry display and packaging. You can just stick a piece on a cardboard, pierce it twice, insert your handmade earrings, and you got yourself a nicely packaged jewelry item for sale. And, you’re using DIY, cheap, and creative ways to brand your stuff.

And here is a testimony of the last idea I listed… see how a simple tape can transform the look of a plain tag?

turquoise green masking tape - feltandwireshop.com

The lace can give tags and jewelry packaging a Victorian feel, especially if you’re using vintage pieces in your designs, like I do. The sky is the limit!

Burst Decorative Packing Tape - via tapeswell.com

Look at this fun pattern… this can look great behind a pair of earrings, as part of a handmade packaging combo. I think one can play around with the Lace (& sisters) Tape, and it’s only for $7 a roll! In my part of the world, we don’t even hear of such things, so I would be grateful if someone out there would send me a Lace Tape as a token of friendship :)