When it comes to a piece of furniture or a rug, I purchase it intending to keep it forever – those items are investments. When it comes to smaller things, light fixtures, wall paint or art on the wall – I’m fully aware that I change them far more frequently than my husband enjoys. The way I look at it is, everyone has a thing! My husbands really cares about cars – our cars, new cars, old cars. He likes talking about them, he likes reading about them, he likes working on them. Decorating is my cars – I like talking about it. I like reading about it. I like doing it. New light fixtures, wall paint, and art on the walls are easy ways to refresh or update a house without breaking the bank. I love my house and I like to keep it looking nice. Call it a waste, call it unnecessary etc. Everyone has a thing – I don’t buy a lot of clothes, we rarely eat out, and we don’t spend a ton on traveling – keeping my house a space I like to be in is my thing.
Our house has 21 light fixtures in it. Yes, I counted… we have 21 fixtures in the part of the house that we use. (There are another 2 rooms we don’t use but that is a whole other post – seriously, I am already working on it.) I am going to be honest, we can’t buy a new light fixture every time I want to replace one. If it sounds like I am making fun of myself for how often I want to change thing like lights, I am.
I think I do a decent job coming up with creative decorating ideas. Sure, there have been a few times I have failed – I tried to stain a seagrass ottoman from Ikea once… my husband came home and asked why the ottoman looked like it had caught on fire… When you take out the occasional fail, most of the time I impress myself with how much I can do with a small budget and some elbow grease.
I love the light I made for our bedroom. We had an old brass foyer light. I honestly can’t remember where we got it from. I think it came out of a house my husband did some work in. My husbands occasionally brings home things he gets from jobs to check and see if I want it for a project first. He knows the way to my heart. This brass light he brought home reminded me so much of the light my parents had in their foyer when I was growing up – their house house was built in 1987. I removed the glass from it and spray painted the fixture with a can of dark spray paint. I used Rust-Oleum Flat Metallic Spray Paint in Burnished Amber – it is dark like oil rubbed bronze metal but has a hint of brown in it which I think gives it good texture. I am very pleased with the results of the light. Brass is coming back in style and I actually really dig it but oil rubbed bronze was the right shade for our calm muted bedroom.
The current light in our kitchen is also one I made. It was made from a bathroom vanity light. I like the results so much that I did it a second time to make a light for our foyer. I started with a 3 bulb bathroom vanity light just like this one – the light I used for the kitchen was just like the one in the link – same brand and color, and removed the glass sconces.
I then removed the center bulb. The entire metal piece where the center bulb is screws completely off. You can then pull the wires out for the center bulb. Each bulb has its only wires that run from the ceiling mount to the bulb socket.
Next, I turned the two remaining metal pieces (which have plastic bulb sockets in them) so that when you mount the light, the bulbs are facing down. One side turned easily for me. The other side was screwed on very tightly. I tried very hard to get it to turn, I eventually had to ask my husband to do it and he got it to turn using pliers. If you feel like the end pieces won’t move for you, keep tying. They may be on tight but the light is assembled by screwing those end pieced on so they will move. The light I used for the kitchen was already oil rubbed bronze but I used the same Burnished Amber spray paint on the silver one for my foyer. That’s it! It is now time to just mount your light to the ceiling using the regular mounting hardware and directions that the light came with. The only thing we have left to do is touch up our ceiling where the new light has a much smaller base. Ceiling paint is now on the list!
You now have an industrial, simple, exposed bulb fixture (which you have been seeing everywhere lately). Bathroom vanity lights aren’t too expensive and if you are like me, you might already have some lying around!
Good luck if you decide to update some of your own light fixtures! Post pictures if you do!!!
Three Oaks Farm 