Things are a little askew in my little life at the moment, so I decided to do a little something to take my mind off of things. Our final for Color & Light is to design and build a custom light. Two birds, one stone. Perfect.
This is the original, from Anthropologie:
Cute, but not $300 cute. No way, Jose!
So here's what I did.
FIRST, I thrifted all day long for vintage dishes. I wanted them to be mostly white, but when I found the green I was smitten and I had to include it. My Great Aunt also donated the pretty textured glass dish that I used for the base. All of my dishes were a buck a piece. SCORE. (As far as dishes, you will need: three saucers, two teacups, one teapot, and a bowl)
THEN, I took a reluctant trip to Lowe's to buy 1.) A wiring kit (9 bucks), some epoxy (4 bucks), a diamond drill bit for ceramics (12 bucks) and browse lamp shades.
Once I got everything home, I removed all of the sticker residue (HATE STICKER RESIDUE) with rubbing alcohol, and then washed everything in warm soapy water.
Then I would suggest dry fitting everything to figure out how you want it to look. Some dishes fit a lot better than others, so it's sort of just trial and error.
After you have the arrangement you want, take a sharpie and make a dot in the center of each dish.
You'll need to drill through all of the dishes so that the wire can go all the way through. This was probably the most tedious part of the entire process. Each dish will take anywhere from 1-5 minutes, depending on the thickness of the porcelain. AND you need a special drill bit. This one worked really well and wasn't too expensive.
Once you've drilled through the center of all of the dishes, you need to thread the wire through whatever you've chosen as your base. Then, you will mix a small amount of epoxy as you go. Attach the base to the next piece after threading it through. You get the idea.
This epoxy worked really well. It's cheap, and you don't end up needing more than one.
Continue threading the wire and epoxying your dishes together. You'll want a teacup to be the last piece so that you can cover it with something to attach to the socket. I used a canning lid, but it was sort of flimsy, so perhaps a piece of metal that fits over the teacup opening. You might also use wood. Drill a hole through it and attach the socket. The directions for wiring you socket should be on the back of your wiring kit, and will be a lot easier to understand than me trying to explain it. Ha.
I used a harp-less shade for mine, but you could also attach a harp to the socket (it's included in your kit) and choose a shade that needs a harp. And here's what it looks like when it's done:
I'm pretty pleased with it. :)
Hope your week is going smoothly. It's soooo cold out!
Love, Mae
