Scalloped Light Shade Tutorial

I have been waiting with great anticipation to share this light shade with you. It has already been finished in my bedroom for a while, but I've just been to busy to blog about it. These were my inspiration:

I have been working on making over my bedroom. I wanted to make it a bright and happy place, but at the same time, peaceful. I feel like this light shade evokes what I'm going for.

Want to make it? Here we go!


Here are the materials that you will need:
      1. 1 yard of felt, maybe more if you go with a larger diameter than I did
      2. Scissors
      3. Pen and pencil
      4. Two lamp washer tops. Ok, what you need here totally depends on the existing light fixture in your bedroom. If yours is like mine, use these. If not, you'll have to do some jury rigging.
      5. Parchment paper or acetate. The parchment worked for me, but if you find it too flimsy, acetate should work. I think that the .003 thickness would work best. Since I haven't used it, I can't guarantee that the glue would stick, but if I can get felt to stick on parchment, I'm guessing acetate will be fine. Next time I do something like this, I will be trying acetate.
      6. Long ruler
      7. Glue stick and hot glue gun

Here is the template for the scallop. Click on the scallop to open it in another browser, then print it off. Before you print it, you may need to adjust the size. It depends on how big of scallops you want. The template is pretty huge, my template was about half of this size. The number of inches that your scallop is has to be divisible by the circumference of your washer top, or at least close. Otherwise you'll have a weird gap. Trace this shape onto your felt. I needed about 100 for mine.

Cut out the felt scallops.

 

Cut out a piece of parchment the circumference plus 1inch of your largest lamp washer top, and 10 inches tall. The extra one inch is for the overlap when you glue it into a cylinder. I actually used an embroidery hoop because I didn't know where to get them when I made mine.

Now you're going to take your pencil and your ruler and make horizontal lines on your parchment, one inch apart. Make them as light as you can, because you don't want dark lines showing through your light shade. Starting at the right edge on the bottom of your parchment, you will line the flat top of your scallop with your pencil line. I found that the glue stick works fine on parchment, but only if you weigh it down for a couple seconds. Be very delicate with the scallops on the parchment until they're fully dry. Glue them along like this the whole way down the line, pressing each scallop with some books. Never put scallops on that last inch. On your second line, you won't start at the edge. Divide the width of your scallop by two, and then start gluing, so that your scallops are staggered. For example, my scallop was 4 inches, so there was a blank space of 2 inches before I started my second row of scallops. Go all the way up, alternating rows, leaving an inch at the top to be folded over the lamp washer top

Just to be safe, I sewed the top row of scallops onto the parchment, but I'm sure if you're patient enough to let your glue dry you won't need to. Alternatively, if you want it very secure, you could sew every row.

When the glue is all dry, it is time to use your hot glue gun to glue your parchment to the lamp washer top. Cut little snips in that top inch that will be folded over, that it can fit the round lamp washer top. When that is dry and secure, gently take your lampshade to an ironing board and glue up that side seam, pressing it with books until you feel it's safe. When that is done, glue scallops over the empty spaces in the seam.


Follow the instructions for the second tier, and a third if you wish. Then you're done! As long as this tutorial is, it is really so easy and the payoff is amazing!