Painter Girl

Finish Shades Project

Here are the pics of the variety of shades I completed for a client recently.  With his first group, I simply added trim and Swarovski crystals to embellish.  The "before" is on the left, "after" on the right:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For this next group, I created all new shade coverings, using RocLon® Multipurpose Cloth:

 

 

I did a soft glaze on the fabric and used a Poppy stencil from Cutting Edge Stencils, added trim and crystals.

 

 

 

Same soft glaze for this one, my own leaf stencil, gems and trim.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This once very plain off white shade is one of my favorites.  My client had some fabulous fabric that had these raised flowers.  I cut the flowers out and glued them to the shade, adding the stems, leaves, gems and trim.

For very little time and money, you can easily see how you can totally transform your lampshades! For all you DIY-ers, look in the remnant section for trim and interesting fabrics.  Here you can often find the high priced items for a fraction of the cost.

A Little More Progress With the Shades

 

 

I'm using a combination of metallic paints and foils to further embellish these shades.  I know I showed you how these foils work at least once, but I thought I'd give another quick overview.  Here, I have already applied the sizing and it is ready to go.  I've placed my sheet of foil over my designed and burnished with a stiff brush, so the green foil comes off the sheet,transferring to my canvas shade.

 

 

 

 

 

Here is what is left on my shade...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...and here is what the foils sheet now looks like.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm using a little of this "Extreme Glitter" from Plaid.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I applied it over a stenciled scroll with a liner brush.  It goes on white...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...but dries clear, just adding a little more sparkle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The cast of paint characters I used for these shades.

 

 

 

 

 

With the painting piece is done, I will glue on some Swarovski crystals and attempt to adhere these pieces to the shades.

 

 

 

Creating Some Lampshades

I have these three shades to transform for a client:

 

 

I have 2 of these              

 

They belong to the 3 bases I showed you the other day:

 

 

A little searching on the net, yielded this great YouTube with instructions showing how to create a pattern for the shades:

 

 

 

Next, I moved from my warm, comfortable dining room table, down to the dungeon, aka, my not so warm and comfortable studio in my basement. I am using RocLon® Mulit-Purpose Cloth for my fabric.  I base coated one large piece with 2 coats of latex paint, cut out the shapes using my patterns,  then glazed (obviously allowing some drying time inbetween). 

 

 

For this shade, I used three different leaf stencils I created a zillion years ago.  As you can see, I still am not cleaning my stencils, just reusing them as is.  For those of you appalled by this method, please feel free to come and clean all of my stencils for me. :-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the shade on the right, I used a stencil I had on hand from Cutting Edge Stencils, the Poppy Allover.

 

 

For the panelled shade, I used a small scroll stencil I picked up at Michaels.

This is as far as I've gotten so far.  Today I will be back in the dungeon studio embellishing these designs. More to come....

 

Fun with Lamps and Lampshades

I have recently been transforming a lot of lamps and lampshades and am having a blast doing so!  This is really so easy, that I'm sure anyone who can master Gluing 101, can do this.  It's a quick, inexpensive way to give new life to an old lamp.  Here are few I have done:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next week I will be working on some custom shades for these three bases.