WHEW!
It
has been a ridiculously busy year! We closed on our home at the end of 2012, celebrated my son’s 7th birthday the first weekend of January
(more on that to come), I accepted my
D-R-E-A-M
job (aka: work from home and still make an amazing living) with an incredible
company, my love accepted a position with an engineering firm downtown and in
the middle of all of that, we've maintained some semblance of a social live
while renovating and upgrading aspects of the new place.
I’ll
dedicate sporadic posts to all of the neat things that my honey built with his new-found carpentry skills, but would like to kick off the home-improvement
portion of my little inter-web home with a step-by-step of how I made our dining
chandelier!
A lot of my pictures were lost during an unfortunate Apple Store
visit, where we found out that the phone would need to be replaced before I had
a chance to back-up the last week or so of memory, so I apologize in advance for the lack of pictures to accompany each step.
THIS Pottery Barn chandelier is really cute and vintage-y yet still kind of modern
in its own way. It’s funky and different and….it's US. We had to have it. What we didn't have to have was the 16 pendant aspect OR the $400 price tag.
A
few Google searches and stops at WorldMarket, Lowe’s, & IKEA and we were
well on our way to a custom light fixture.
SUPPLIES:
- Mason
jars (buy as many as you will need to get the look you’re going for)
- Single
drop-lights (same number as jars)
- Edison
Filament bulbs – you can go with regular bulbs, but I prefer the look of these.
- Material
for the frame
- Drill
with bits
- Exacto
knife
- Wire
strippers
- Electrical
tape
- Hammer
and one large nail
1. Trace the opening for the lightbulb
socket onto the center of the mason jar lids and CAREFULLY cut out the traced
circles. Your lightbulb sockets should now fit perfectly into place – you will
need to press firmly to get the lid past the threaded plastic. If you purchased
from IKEA your drop lights have a plastic piece that can e screwed on to give everything
a more finished look. Go ahead and use the nail to put a few holes in the lid
as well. This will allow the heat to escape.
(Like this)
2.
Decide where you will want each jar
positioned and mark the board. Drill a hole on each marking using a bit large
enough that the wiring will have room to easily feed through. If you plan on
painting or staining your wood you’ll want to do that before you begin. Didn’t
do that? Go ahead and do that now & let it dry completely. You will want to research various hanging
options and find the one that best suits your needs and taste.
3. The lights have a plug at one end. Cut that plug off. It feels SO wrong, but just do it – trust me.
Feed each wire through its hole on the board.
4. Use
the wire strippers to remove the plastic coating from the end of each wire,
being careful not to rip off the wire itself. You’ll want to determine the
length you want for each pendant at this point. I used a spot of one of the
wires as a reference point and after holding the others to the length I wanted,
firmly zip-tied all of them together.
5. Secure
the frame to the ceiling. In my case, I built a shallow box with 4 - 2” x ¼”
planks fastened into a square and attached it to the ceiling with L brackets,
then used an 18” x 18” x ¼” board with the wires running through it and
attached it to this frame once it was all wired together.
6. Here’s
the exciting part (and an extra set of hands is helpful)!!!
***TURN
OFF THE BREAKER THAT CORRESPONDS TO THE AREA WHERE THE CHANDELIER WILL HANG***
Separate the white-coated wires from the
black-coated. Twist ALL of the white wires together including the one from the
electrical box on the ceiling, secure a wire cap or wrap well with electrical
tape. I used plenty of tape to ensure full coverage. You do not want ANY
exposed wire or you’re risking fire. Repeat with the black wires.
Who doesn't love a beautifully coiled filament bulb?
7.
Once everything is insulated nicely, put
in your bulbs; turn on the breaker and light switch to make sure that all of
your pendants are working. If they are, go ahead and secure everything into
place. For me this meant screwing the 5th board on to the frame.
8.
Secure the jars to the lids and stand
back in awe of your beautiful new chandelier!
This is my finished fixture which hangs over our dining table.
It's love.
Total
cost for my version? $50
5
Mason Jars: $15 at WorldMarket
5
drop lights: $15 at IKEA
Edison
Filament bulbs: $12 (for 2) at Lowe’s
Bright
white filament bulbs: $6 (for 3) at Lowe’s
Wood
for frame: $10 at Lowe’s
Tools
& small supplies: FREE – my love had them already
I
hope you step out of your comfort zone and try this neat project. There really is an awesome sense of
accomplishment in having done it myself rather than shelling 350 extra dollars
for a pre-made fixture.
Have you ever tried an extra-adventurous
DIY project? What was it and how pleased were you with the results?
