Glow Lightshade

something to look at as you fall asleep

Posted by Britta J.

About

My friend was saying he needed a new lightshade for his room, and soon after I discovered an old paper shade perfectly preserved in the compost bin from the previous tentants! So I got it out, dusted it off, and thought about how to decorate it. This took a while as I am wont to forget about things and then come back to them. Eventually one day I was bored and suddenly decided that what it needed was some funky paint work! Thus ensued the creativity...
I didn't take photos as I went along but these pictures illustrate the step descriptions :)

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You Will Need (3 things)

  • glow in the dark Paint
  • paper Lamp Shade
  • blue and silver Acrylic Paint

Steps (6 steps, 60 minutes)

  1. 1

    Get your paper shade ready. This style is everywhere now, pick one up from IKEA if you don't have one spare already. I opened mine out with the wire support inside it so that all the paper was uncreased and ready for painting. I held it and rotated it in my left hand rather than have it hanging since I didn't want it swinging about all the time.

  2. 2

    Squeeze a small amount of dark blue acrylic onto a pallette and dilute with about triple the amount of water. Use a paintbrush to apply this all over the outside of the lightshade, making some bits darker or lighter (more concentrated or watery paint) as you please for a nice textured effect.

  3. 3

    Don't worry about allowing that last step to dry, if it's wet it helps the next load of paint blend in. To your diluted blue paint, add a big squeeze of silver acrylic and mix. Dab and flick this on all over until you are happy with the coverage.

  4. 4

    Finally, take a smaller brush and dot on the glow-in-the-dark paint all over. Try to do clusters and some bigger or smaller than the rest, to make it look like constellations of stars. Allow to dry.

  5. 5

    finished lightshade

  6. 6

    Allow it to soak up some light and then switch off the lights! My camera isn't sensitive enough to pick up the glow so I drew a picture to help you imagine :)