What if I DIYed a Skyline Lamp?

What if Wednesday this week involved even more crafting. I feel like I am becoming the crafting queen!

The Vote

My friend Addie (remember the curly haired girl from last week) chose the pins for this week's What if Wednesday. She picked a DIY Phone Charger Holder and a Skyline Lampshade.

The Skyline Lampshade won in the Instagram poll by a landslide. I feel my inner crafting soccer mom coming out more, day by day. Its pretty fun.

The Supplies

I followed this post about the Skyline Lampshade throughout the process. I headed to Deseret Industries to find a lamp to poke some holes in. I only have one lamp, and I didn't really have a desire to poke holes in it. At DI, I found giant lamps and tiny ones. So, thinking about the size of my room, I went with the tiny lamp.

Then I got some paint, ball point pins, and printed out a skyline outline of Paris. I have always loved Paris and the Eiffel Tower. My dream is to visit that magnificent city.

The Painting

Once I had added to my arsenal of craft supplies, I started painting my lamp. I wanted to paint it all black, but I wasn't sure whether spray paint or regular paint would work better. (And yes, I happened to have that spray paint lying around). I spray painted the base of the lamp, in my room, which I do not suggest. I figured since it was so small, I could get away with it by protecting around it with styrofoam plates. But it looked terrible and I learned that spray paint dissolves foam. Who knew?

So, the takeaway should be just to paint the whole lamp with black (not spray) paint. The lampshade needed several coats. I gave it one and started poking holes, but had to go repaint it afterwards.

The Holes

The next step was the exciting part. I taped my simple skyline of Paris onto the lamp. I found that because of the cone shape of the lamp, it was better to cut the design so it fit better around the edges.

Then, I followed the instructions from the blog and started poking holes along the outline. I tried to make sure to poke a hole in every corner. I also wiggled the pin to make the holes a tad larger.

Once I was finished with the holes, there was some white dust from the previous color of the lampshade.

But I plugged it in anyways, to see how it looked.

The Final Touches

I was stoked about how it turned out! The only thing I needed to do was add another coat of paint, to hide the previous leaf design. I then had to poke some of the holes again, to get the paint out.

Here it is (above) with the light of my room. My cute little LBL (little black lamp).

The hardest part about this whole project was actually taking good pictures. That lamp, though little, is very bright, which my camera didn't like.

Also, I want to know your thoughts on whether I should add stars to the lamp, or just keep the outline.

Please comment below about what you thought about this week's What if Wednesday!

#skylinelamp #DIY #homedecor #Pinterest #Paris