Make lampshades from paper for your home

Many home owners often have old table or floor lamps, which no longer suit their personal taste. Instead of buying a new lampshade, home owners can opt to make one, on their own. There are a number of styles that one can choose from, to make a unique lampshade that suits one's style. For this project, you will need an old lampshade for the basic frame, fabric or paper of your choice to cover it, a thin piece of ribbon to match the fabric or paper, trimmings such as bows, beads, tassels, sea shells, small pebbles etc., glue and a pair of tweezers. Ensure that you've got the right length of the paper or fabric and the readymade lamp base, to make it convenient for you to glue your own fabric or paper. Your first step will entail wrapping the fabric or paper of your choice around the frame. While cutting out the shape of your lampshade, make sure you leave about half an inch at the top and bottom edges, so that you can glue the edges neatly on the inside of the frame. Once you have glued the fabric or paper neatly to the frame, glue the narrow piece of ribbon to the edges, to give your frame a clean look. Now, it is time to personalise your lampshade. You can stick pebbles, beads or sea shells directly on the shade, using tweezers. Alternatively, use ribbed sea shells or some other home-made stencil such as a cut ladyfinger or French bean. Now, dip the sea shells and the other stencil items in paint and create evenly spaced designs of your choice. You can also stick a row of tassels on the bottom of your lamp shade. If the lampshade is for your children's room, you can use a cardboard with paper glued onto it. Cardboard will enable you to cut out shapes of stars and other favourite cartoon characters, which will then give out images of those characters on the wall, when the lamp is lit. If you're making your own lampshade, use only low-wattage light bulbs to ensure that your fabric, paper and other trimmings do not catch fire, as high-wattage bulbs can get very hot when lit for long periods.