Curbly

Lamp Make Over–Zero Dollars

When shopping for lamps–used or new–I like to buy things I can make over, just in case the mood strikes. The make over, as we all know, is easiest to accomplish with paint. In the lamp world, that means anything but ceramics with glossy finishes. (So far, I haven’t found any paint that covers and adheres well to semi-glossy or glossy ceramic.) So I look for metal–even shiny brass can be sanded with fine grit sandpaper and painted–or matte ceramic. Take this old lamp, for example. It was way past its prime and ready for a facelift.

First, the paint.

I put on two coats of my custom-made antique bronze paint with a foam brush. In this case the old white cord did not coordinate with the new dark color, so I painted it as well.

Second, the shade.

I had an old faux leather lampshade on hand, which I thought would work perfectly. The only problem was, it attached by this method....

and the old shade attached like such.

This, however, was an easy fix. All I needed was a lamp harp (pictured below), which I had on hand but you can find at just about any hardware or big box store.

I popped off the bottom of the harp and slipped the top of the harp onto the fixture, like so.

I fixed the shade onto the lamp via the harp's accompanying finial and the make over was complete.

Tagged : lamp, lighting, make_over