nostalgiecat: DIY rag lampshade

My goodness!

It feels like it's been ages since I did a DIY post!

I've had loads of little and large projects on the go recently, but somehow they've yet to manifest in a blogpost. I was planning on keeping this one under wraps until I was ready to reveal my Spare room makeover, but I felt so bad that I hadn't given you guys a creative post for a while....so here it is!

I was after a new lightshade for my new look spare room, and I wanted something light and airy to go with my decorating concept....after a long search online, only to find that the one I liked the look of (The Z1 pendant was way out of my budget) I came up with this solution.

And I love it!

This is a really easy DIY: All I used was a cheap sheet and some lampshade rings from an old shade.

So all in all this ended up costing me just £3 to make!

Not bad hey?

I think it looks great in the New look spare room (which is almost done....just wait and see)

I can't help it, I am so excited to show you all how it's turning out, so here's a little sneak peek of the DIY lightshade in it's new surroundings:

I was considering doing some kind of dip-dye effect on the ends of it, but I actually love how light and airy it looks in plain white.

Of course, if you fancy making one, you could choose to do this (See my Dip dye curtain tutorial here to find out how) or you could choose to use a colored, or even printed fabric to suit your tastes and decor.

Anyway, today I will show you how I made mine:

What you'll need:

*Lampshade carriers: I used the rings of an old lampshade, but you can buy the parts online.

*You'll need a utility ring for the top, and a slightly smaller lampshade ring for the bottom.

*An old or cheap flat white sheet

*Some scissors

SAFETY FIRST!

The first thing you'll need to do is fireproof the material.

NOTE: Fabric can never be fully fire-proof, but this will make the fabric fire-resistant (meaning it won't burn without contact with a flame or ignition source)

You can do this by soaking the fabric in a fireproofing solution , like Firecheck, or you can make your own using Borax powder dissolved in boiling water.

For this you'll need:

*Borax powder and

*A cup and a spoon

Here's how:

Boil up 6-8 cups of water in an old saucepan, and add 2,5 tablespoons of borax per cup of water.

Stir until the borax has completely dissolved to make a saturated solution.

Place your sheet into the solution, and leave to soak for 15-20 minutes.

Don't rinse.

Hang your sheet to dry.

Now, let's get started with making the lampshade:

Cut the sheet into 1" strips.

I just made a little cut into the end of the sheet, then ripped the strips...

...this creates a natural , curled edge to your strips of fabric.

Trim off any loose threads created by the ripping.

Attach the Utility lampshade ring to your light fitting.

(make sure the light is switched off first)...

Fold each strip in half, then tie them onto the top ring, as shown in the pictures above.

The knot wants to resemble a tie knot.

Keep going around until you've filled the ring.

You'll end up with something jelly-fish like....like in the picture above.

Next up you'll need to decide where you want the smaller ring.

If you have a very high ceiling, you may want to make the lampshade longer, but I chose to place it about halfway down the fabric strips.

Using the same "knot" as before, wind the fabric strips around the lampshade ring.

Just start somewhere, and keep going until the ring is covered with the strips.

Because the lower ring is slightly smaller than the top, it may get a bit tight knotting all the fabric strips on..

When you have tied all the fabric strips around the smaller lampshade ring, you can manipulate the knots so that it's all level....

...or, like I did, leave it a bit wonky for a more casual look.

To finish it off, I cut the ends of the fabric strips into points.

You can of course get creative and cut the bottom of your shade into a diagonal shape or similar...

....just make sure it is short enough to walk under (Getting a fabric jellyfish wig every time you walk under it , may seem funny at first....but the novelty will wear off!)