DIY Friday: Lamp Makeovers

Today's DIY is something I did back when I was making my apartment less of a bachelorette pad and more of a home for a man and woman.  So my beloved thrifted yellow lamps had to... not be yellow anymore.  I didn't have money to buy new lamps, because, let's face it-- lamps are unreasonably expensive.  $60 +?!  Who has that for a new lamp?!  Not me.  So I thought I'd be brave and try my hand at spray-painting, and if they looked awful, I'd just have to bite the bullet and buy new ones.


Turns out they look awesome, like they've never been yellow in their lives.


I used Krylon glossy spray paint in a dark gray color.  


I took those suckers out behind my apartment building on the grass and sprayed them evenly, from about a foot away.  It took about 5 minutes per lamp.  After letting them set for a few more minutes, I brought those bad boys upstairs, put a paper towel under them, and let them fully dry.  My yellow lamps now look like this:

Most people don't even realize they're the same lamps, and thought I'd bought new ones.  So here's my DIY encouragement to you: pop into a thrift store.  Find a lamp whose base shape you like.  Find a glossy Krylon spray paint color you love (about $5 from Walmart).  Be sure it's the kind that is glossy, and can be sprayed on ceramics.  Spray that sucker.  Then pop back into the thrift store to find a lamp shade (what I had to do!).  Now you have a new, lovely lamp, completely customized to your color scheme.  Hooray!

*edit: sorry if these pics are so dark!  They were fine on my laptop at home, but viewing this at work... they look like I took the picture in a cave!



xoxo, A