OMG LAMPSHADE

July 6, 2007 9:13 AM

Can you please astonish and inspire me with ideas for homemade lampshades?

I have a floor lamp that I need a shade for; I'm very crafty and prefer to make the shade, if possible. I'm looking for inspiration so that the result is certain to delight and drop jaws. Googling around at DIY stuff is hit/miss, so I thought I would ask the most aggressively ingenious people I know of-- my fellow MeFites-- for your suggestions.

posted by hermitosis to home & garden (25 comments total)

This is a cool idea
posted by zeoslap at 9:23 AM on July 6, 2007 [1 favorite]

You could cut the paper out of a normal lampshade, replace it with transparent plastic, then glue old film reel strips to it- great shadows on the walls.
Or you could take a lampshade and glue cool shaped cut-outs on the inside so that it seems standard until you turn it on and see silhouettes.
posted by rmless at 9:24 AM on July 6, 2007

You could do something like these slide lampshades if blocking the light isn't too big a priority.
posted by waterlily at 9:33 AM on July 6, 2007

I've got a lamp with a metal colander as a shade. It's the right size, a good shape, and it casts nice looking shadows and reflections.
posted by notyou at 9:40 AM on July 6, 2007

We have a lamp shade that we found at an antique shop that is made out of dozens of very thin circles that were cut out of corrugated cardboard. Each ring is slightly larger than the ring above it, giving it a classic lampshade shape. The rings are also randomly rotated, so that the pattern formed by the corrugations are varied from one level to the next. It's pretty stunning, but it is rather dark, and gets hellaciously dusty. If you (or anyone else) is interested, I can take some pictures.
posted by Rock Steady at 9:53 AM on July 6, 2007

You could take a piece of veneer and use that as a cool shade
posted by zeoslap at 9:54 AM on July 6, 2007

I just made on in the style zeoslap mentioned, out of really neat aquarium backing material. (The kinds I used is actually not seen there, it's translucent and wavy blue vinyl I believe, with ridges like a fresnel lens, so that the light dispersal shifts as you tilt it or move relative to the cylinder of the shade.)

I took a pair of these, measured out my rectangle of material, and folded it over the circle toward the interior of the cylinder-to-be. Then I held it in place with clothespins, upended it so the clothespins were supporting it on the work surface like little feet and took off a few of them at a time, filling the fold with the right kind of glue. (flexible and plastic-friendly in my material's case.)

I wish I could post the pictures I took of the process, but my camera went missing. It looks great.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 9:58 AM on July 6, 2007

Make a lampshade that looks like a fedora.
posted by Stynxno at 10:08 AM on July 6, 2007

Use radiograph/xray film. That shit is cool.
posted by hatchetjack at 10:15 AM on July 6, 2007

I wish I had time to make this polygon lamp shade. It's for a ceiling light, however, I'm sure you could find something to attach it to a floor lamp.
posted by KathyK at 10:19 AM on July 6, 2007

I re-covered a boring lampshade using Japanese washi paper, and then added some simple trim from the fabric store to finish it off. It makes a simple lamp much more interesting and classy.
posted by doubtful_guest at 10:25 AM on July 6, 2007

I did what doubtful_guest said - the washi paper was perfect for mine :)

Also check out craftster.org - people post their finished projects, and that can be a good source of inspiration - even the stuff that's not done. Also what's your decor and/or design interest? That tends to determine what I'm going to build. Sites like Stylehive are useful for poking around at stuff, although it's more Mod in general. I often look at sites or books of what interests me (like, say, Mod), and then take my sketchbook and then have fun. Or of course if you know a good craft supply store or fabric store, see what they have and go from there...
posted by rmm at 10:32 AM on July 6, 2007

Use radiograph/xray film. That shit is cool.

If you do this, stick to compact fluorescent bulbs. According to my dad's radiologist, x-rays can combust from the heat of a regular bulb.

Ikea hacker has a how-to on applying veneer to a lampshade.

-flattened and perforated tin cans
-corrugated plastic "For Sale" signs (via Readymade, reg. required)
-colored vinyl records, melted into shape
-Zip disks
posted by hydrophonic at 11:06 AM on July 6, 2007

Maybe this? It's actually really easy to fold...I've made a couple for fun, although I have no lamp to put it on.
posted by gueneverey at 11:10 AM on July 6, 2007

Along the lines of notyou's colander, I have been trying to adapt a wire lampshade frame so that I could hang a varying selection of glass and porcelain dishes on it-- a kind of chandelier/dishdrainer effect is what I'm trying to achieve, using very colorful glass.

As I'm writing this, I'm wondering what sort of effect you could get by stripping the cloth from a lampshade and replacing it with hanging stainless silverware, from a thrift store, say.

All this is probably too heavy and too top heavy for a floor lamp, though.
posted by jamjam at 11:52 AM on July 6, 2007

Oh yeah, I also have a great dodecahedral lamp I made from CDs. Microwaved, and dremeled five holes in at the border. The more reflective surface goes inward and it created a great rainbow vortex in there.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:16 PM on July 6, 2007 [1 favorite]

You can make transparencies at Kinkos for, like, 79¢, and I've used them to make lampshades.
posted by klangklangston at 1:04 PM on July 6, 2007

if you're into the veneer idea, check out this site to see pretty much every different type of wood you could make it with.

also, I've seen a pretty cool lamp done with a big box grater
posted by The Esteemed Doctor Bunsen Honeydew at 1:18 PM on July 6, 2007

I'm a big fan of maps, so I used mod-podge to put lamps on an old lampshade. If you do this, try to find maps that aren't double sided! I didn't even think about this, and it looks kind of funny when lit. As it stands, the lamp is more decoration than lighting element.
posted by jetskiaccidents at 1:25 PM on July 6, 2007

If you're a better knitter than I am... maybe this one?
posted by fiercecupcake at 1:33 PM on July 6, 2007

My Mum made a cool lampshade. She took a wire shade frame (that standard trapezoid-ish shape) and wrapped it in raw, unspun but carded wool (she's a spinner). It looked cool and gave a lovely warm light to the room. You can buy wool ready for spinning in all kinds of colours. Undyed wool like hers gives a warm homey feel, but you can also buy all kinds of vibrant artificial colours which would give a more modern look. Unspun wool smells cool too.
posted by shelleycat at 6:04 PM on July 6, 2007

On non-preview, Mum's lampshade is like the non-knitted version of the one linked by fiercecupcake.
posted by shelleycat at 6:05 PM on July 6, 2007

For a time, I built and sold lamps for a living. Here are some of them.
posted by Tube at 12:31 AM on July 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

Get a toy or stuffed cat or dog and impale it on the lamp so that the bulb screws into its mouth (or it has two bulbs for eyes). Now put one of those no-lick Elizabethan cone collars around its neck as a shade and you have to pull its leash or tags to turn it on or off. Less elaborate: just have the head inside the cone.
posted by pracowity at 8:49 AM on July 7, 2007

Hey, here are those lamp pictures of mine.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 11:30 PM on July 7, 2007