I have been seeing these chandeliers everywhere and I love them. They have the classic sophistication of the traditional crystal chandelier with a contemporary updated feel. The thing I did not like about the ones I saw was the $250 – $1200 price tag. YIKES!
So I thought…how hard could it be??? I headed to the salvage yard and I found this sad, dirty, dusty, nasty old light fixture for $4.25. I know what you are thinking…I may have gotten ripped off. Its OK, I just KNEW it had potential!
The BEFORE…
…and AFTER…
Trust me when I say that the picture does not do this beauty justice. The crystal prisms sparkle and reflect light all over the room. It was impossible however to photograph it with the light on or using the flash as the brilliant crystals reflected too much light and distorted the picture.
This project was very easy. Here is what I did..
I took the light apart, washed and sanded all the pieces, sprayed it with primer, sprayed it with silver paint, and put it all back together.
I bought some high quality (yet really inexpensive!) crystal prisms from crystalplace.com, some jump rings from the local craft store, and a nylon washer for each light bulb at Ace Hardware. I sprayed the washers silver to match the lamp (picture below is pre-painting), attached the crystals to the washer using the jump rings, removed the bulb, added the washer with crystals and inserted the bulb back in to secure it in place.
I then added a few more crystal to the fixture itself, and finished it with an inexpensive lamp shade from lampsplus.com.
Taddah…My own shaded chandelier!
